


Love at First Slip Stitch

by Cleopatra (empressofthelight)



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! - All Media Types, Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Adorable Dragons, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Ironicly there's no magic here, M/M, Multi, Red String of Fate, Red String of Fate AU, Video game company Kaiba Corporation-au, just lots and lots of string, love in different forms, not real ones
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-09
Updated: 2020-02-09
Packaged: 2021-02-28 05:28:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 22,888
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22639261
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/empressofthelight/pseuds/Cleopatra
Summary: Had it to here and then some with the damn red string that plagued his very existence, Kaiba is conned into asking Mokuba for help. Now he has a small crocheted red dragon waddling behind him everywhere he goes. Unfortunately, it catches the eye of the person on the other end of the thread. Kaiba never wanted to deal with him.
Relationships: Jounouchi Katsuya | Joey Wheeler/Kaiba Seto, Mutou Yuugi/Yami Yuugi | Atem
Comments: 23
Kudos: 175





	Love at First Slip Stitch

**Author's Note:**

> This started out with the image of Kaiba doing his BA Kaiba shit with a red string in his hand and a little dragon following him around taking the BA level down to fucking precious. I hope you enjoy this little soulmate/red string of fate AU!
> 
> Please check out the art inspired by this fic by [ Five_seas](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Five_seas/pseuds/Five_seas) [ here!](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25960615/chapters/63567868#workskin)

Kaiba hated the string.

It was always too warm. There was so much of it and it got in his way no matter what he did. Even if it wasn't so bad tugging and tangling and gnawing his way through it, it moved. Well moved was a strong word. It twitched, pulsed and twinged like a frayed nerve. Like his frayed nerves dealing with it. How did people deal with this? Was it always like this? 

That thought stayed with him swirling around at the edges of the presentation he was supposed to be paying attention to but could not. His fingers kept twitching, like someone was tugging gently on the string trying to get his attention. They had his attention alright. If he ever found the person on the other end of this elaborate and brightly colored noose, he’d string them up by it. 

“-down, but projections for next quarter show an increase of .09%. With this proposal we might even see-”

Pulsing, pulling, warm. Why now? 

“-ming on the rise, sales have doubled. The new factory will open-”

Kaiba’s attention swept over the boardroom of older gentlemen paying zero attention to the young man’s presentation. Even less attention than he gave him. What they had to be distracted with he didn't want to know or dare try to think about, though it would give him a break from the damn string. With his attention back on the presentation (presenter if he was being fair) he wondered if he was having as much trouble with it. He didn’t seem distracted or hindered, pointing to the graphs and charts. His arms didn’t appear heavy or ladened with miles of red string and his fingers didn’t twitch from it being needlessly tugged on. Assuming that’s what it was. He was doing fine. Maybe Kaiba’s string was broken.

If it was broken, he should be able to get rid of it.

“Is there anything you would like to add, Mr. Kaiba?”

His attention snapped up from his twitching fingers and he glared at the room. They shrank back, all except the man who’d asked. “No, I think that’s enough for tonight.”

They nodded and muttered, collecting their briefcases and slithering out of the room. He waited, watching the man who’d given the presentation pack up his things with a soft smile, still unhindered. “You handled that presentation well.”

He stopped mid swing from putting a paper in his briefcase and looked up. At first he looked surprised then he smiled. “Thank you Mr. Kaiba. I didn’t think you heard any of it.”

He humphed, glancing down at his left hand then the door. “I can’t devote all my attention to things I already know the information on.”

He snickered and nodded. “True. At least someone heard part of what I said. I’m pretty sure half of them were asleep through most of it.”

“What’s your name?”

“Atem Sennen.”

Kaiba looked him over and quirked a brow. “I thought you were over in legal.”

He laughed, picking up the briefcase and walking towards the door. “I was bored. Can’t stay in one place long.”

“So I’ve heard.”

Atem forced a polite smile, but it seemed he was nervous. He had no reason to be. Kaiba followed him out of the board room, increasingly frustrated from the twitches in his fingers.

\---

Joey loved the string.

It was so warm. Warm enough to fight off the cold in his dark apartment with the electric shut off again. He had it wrapped around his shoulders, his arms and his waist, tight around him like a hug from someone who wasn’t there. Pulsing and twitching every now and then to remind him someone was on the other end; someone was there. It was moments like this, filling out another job application by candle light that he felt really lucky in spite of it all. Sure, he didn’t have much, but he had this and no one could take it away. 

His friends talked about the string a lot and their experiences with it were all different. That’s the point, he guessed. Duke bragged all the time about how he had three strings tied to his fingers and one of them led him to his friend Tristan. He still had two more people to find on the other ends of the string, or maybe he was lying. Who knew? No one could see it but you and whoever was on the other end. 

Leaning forward, he blew on the paper, getting some of the string out of the way so he could write. It was just everywhere. He could probably wrap it around the whole apartment and never need to turn the electric back on. He thought about it, but that just sounded silly. He snickered to himself, finishing up the application and tossing the pen aside. That’s enough for one night. He blew the candle out and trudged over to his bed in the dark. His foot hit something and he toppled forward onto the bed. “Ow.”

Hopefully that application would get him a job. At this rate he’d break a bone. Settling into his bed, he pulled the string around him; comforted by the warmth and the soft pulsing as he fell asleep.

\---

“Joey!”

“Hey Yuug’.” He forced a smile, walking into Yuugi’s grandpa’s shop. “How’s it goin’?”

“Oh I don’t know,” Yuugi sang, “Did you get the job?”

He groaned, walking up to the counter and slouched over it.

Yuugi slouched too. “I take that as a no.”

“Nah,” he grumbled into the cold glass, “somethin’ ‘bout ‘not enough experience’. Ya know how it is.”

“Yeah… wow that sucks. There’s got to be something.”

He smiled and pushed himself up to his elbows. “Sure there is! I’ll figure it out, don’t worry.” 

Yuugi flashed him a sympathetic smile then looked around the shop. “Hey, it’s noon. Why don’t we go get some coffee and lunch? I’m sure you’re cold, right?”

Truthfully, he wasn’t cold with the string still wrapped around him, but he wasn’t about to say no to free food. “Sounds great ta me!”

Yuugi giggled and walked around the counter to the door. He flipped the sign that said out to lunch and they left, locking up the shop as they went. Yuugi brought his hands together in front of him, fiddling with what Joey assumed was the strong tied to his finger like he always did while they walked, looking around at everyone's hands that they passed. Joey snickered and shook his head at him.

“What?”

“Any luck?”

“Shut up, Joey.”

He laughed, shoving his hands in his pockets. “Sorry, ya just make it so obvious.”

Yuugi pouted, pink tinging his cheeks. “I can’t help it.”

“Ya really can. It’ll happen when it happens.”

“I know that.”

“Do ya though?”

Yuugi glared at him and shoved his shoulder almost sending him out into the street. He laughed following Yuugi into the cafe. It was busy, hell it was noon it better be busy, but the line wasn’t out the door like it was some days. He looked around the crowded cafe expecting to see someone they knew. Yuugi looked around for someone he’d never seen before. 

“Next!”

The line inched forward and Joey caught sight of their friends at a table off in the corner. Ryou sat up and waved at them. He waved back. “Well we gotta table.”

“That’s good!” The line inched forward again and Yuugi looked down at his hands. He giggled and took another step forward. “I'm glad Ryou’s here. I forgot to ask him about his date.”

“Oh yeah! Forgot he had that.”

They stepped up to the counter and Joey got a good look at someone he wasn’t expecting behind it. “Tea?! Since when’d ya start workin’ here?”

“Since last week, now come on. What do you want? There’s tons of people here.”

Joey glared at her. One, that was rude and two, he applied for that job last week and got turned down for ‘not enough experience. He knew damn well he had more than her! Yuugi pulled on his sleeve and then pushed him gently away. “I’ve got our order. Go make sure Duke doesn’t steal our seats.”

“I… yeah sure, Yuug’.”

He trudged away through the people, hitting some idiot who wouldn’t get out of his way on the way to the table. This day was going to shit. 

\---

Was this overboard? Overkill? An act of lunacy? Probably, but he just couldn’t stand it anymore. He wasn’t sure how, but he managed to rig a machete blade into the doorframe so it wouldn’t move (after spending 3 hours sharpening it enough to split a hair) and it was stuck in there good enough that it would hold his weight if he’d completely lost his mind and wanted to swing on it. He wrapped the red thread around the blade a hundred times and pulled it tight.

Nothing. Fucking. Happened. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”

So he pulled harder, leaning back with his heels dug into the ground. Still nothing. So he adjusted the angle, pulling back on the thread and putting a foot up on the door, pushing more than just his weight on it. It looked like something was happening so he stepped up his other foot on the door pulling on it as hard as he could. Between his weight and sheer force of will there was no way it wouldn’t cut!

“Big brother, are you in-”

Kaiba ignored him and pulled harder until something finally gave! Unfortunately, what gave was the blade. It snapped in half; sending him, part of the sharper than sharp blade, and the string toppling to the floor. He laid there on his back, his teeth grit together in frustration and pain, while he contemplated picking up the broken blade and lopping his hand off at the wrist. It wasn’t a bad plan… persay.

“Wow… just wow.”

“What do you want Mokuba?”

“I just,” Mokuba crossed his arms over his chest, leaning back against his desk and shaking his head at the blade handle stuck in the door frame. “I don’t even think screaming ‘how’ or ‘why’ are good enough reactions. This is crazy, Seto. You broke a machete blade without touching it and it literally held you off the ground!”

“Don’t remind me,” Kaiba grunted, picking himself up off the floor since Mokuba obviously wasn't trying to help him out at all. Not that he wanted it, but it would’ve been nice to have it offered so he could refuse.

“I thought-” Mokuba’s unabashed shock disappeared and he _giggled,_ “I'm so excited. I can’t wait.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I thought you adults were just making stuff up, but… that’s real. I saw that.”

Kaiba sat down at his desk, well, fell into his chair was more accurate. He was pretty sure he hurt his back doing that, but fuck it. He tried.

“Why are you trying to cut it?”

“I don’t want it. I’ve-”

“Yeah yeah yeah I know. I _heard_ ,” Mokuba said, holding both hands out to stop him, “So much. Oh my god, so much.”

“Are you finished pestering me?”

Mokuba looked back at the broken handle then him, pulling up a chair and sitting across from him. “Nope. I came in here to tell you I was doing a lot of research into that-” he gestured to the door- “because I thought you might need some help and holy snap yes you do.”

Kaiba scoffed and turned on his computer. He could at least try to work. “If you know how to cut it, tell me. If not, you can’t help.”

“You just broke a machete blade with what I can only assume was an invisible steel cable. So, probably not.”

His shoulders slumped, but he refused to look at Mokuba to show him how disappointed he was hearing that. The computer finally gave him the password screen and he typed it in. He had no idea what he was going to do and Mokuba was still staring at him making it hard to think. Luckily, an email notification pulled his attention to it and he decided to take this moment to go through them. He opened his email box and meticulously went through each one, deleting or relocating them. 

“I’m not really sure why you want to cut it in the first place.”

Still clicking through his emails he tossed his left hand up,showing Mokuba the string, the invisible string. Why did he even bother? “I don’t want this damn-”

“I get it,” Mokuba laughed, apparently thinking the same thing he was, “but why is it bothering you so much? It’s just string.”

“It’s not ‘just string’. It’s-” he clenched his jaw shut, glaring at the monitor. “Just drop it, Mokuba. I’ll figure it out.”

“Do you feel it?”

“Of course I feel it. I wouldn’t be able to pull on-.“

“No, I mean, is it… moving? Like can you feel it?” Mokuba huffed and shook his head. “It’s really weird to explain. They did it better online.”

“Online?”

Mokuba ignored him. “Well, is it?”

He wasn’t going to let this go, was he? Kaiba relented, turning to face Mokuba’s very serious frown. “Yes.”

“A lot or a little?”

“Enough that I’m probably going to cut my hand off.”

Mokuba giggled and shook his head, mouthing ‘wow’ before giggling again. “So a lot.” He bounced a little in the seat, making Kaiba narrow his eyes. He felt like he was missing something. “Okay and it’s apparently strong enough to break a machete blade.”

“Gravity and too much sharpening was enough to break it.”

“Fair enough. So what else is wrong with it?”

“It’s everywhere.”

“I know. You tell me that a lot.”

“That’s good enough. It’s moving and it’s everywhere.”

“And?”

“Why does there need to be an and?”

“Because there is one and you’re not telling me.”

Kaiba folded his hands in front of his chin, looking Mokuba dead in the eyes because he couldn’t possibly understand anything involving the death trap that was the string. “Since you seem to have it all figured out, what is it?”

Mokuba matched him; leaning on the desk on his elbows, hands folded in front of his chin, even mimicked his expression. “I’m going to take a stab in the dark here and say it’s bothering you because it’s pulling at you, and judging by the fact you thought you needed a machete, it’s thick and it’s probably warm to the touch too since you're uncomfortable with it.”

Kaiba felt pain pulse through his jaw from how tight his teeth were clenched. He never told Mokuba any of that and that was concerning. How would he know and if he did know, what did it mean? But Mokuba wasn’t finished.

“I’m also going to guess it’s not just tugging at you a little bit every now and then. It’s constant, like someone plucking a guitar string.”

“What’s your point?”

“My point is I know why it’s like that and you don’t.” 

To Kaiba’s complete horror Mokuba promptly got up and walked out of the office. 

\---

“Hang in there Joey. You’ll find something,” Ryou murmured, patting his shoulder gently. “They were probably just looking for someone like Tea.”

“Yeah, someone with more boobs.” Tristan laughed, nudging him.

Sadly, he was probably right.

“I’ll ask my work if they’re hiring. Then you can work with me!”

“Thanks Ry.”

“Foods up!” Yuugi giggled, sitting beside him with a tray of food. 

Tristan scooted over to give Yuugi more room. Duke refused to move, making Tristan sit up against him. He shrugged his shoulders, wrapping an arm around Tristan, and smirked. “Hey worse comes to worse, Joey, you could try stripping.”

“Need boobs for that too,” he huffed, grabbing the sandwich Yuugi ordered for him.

“Not all strippers are girls,” Yuugi commented then started to laugh, “Though I’m sure having boobs would help a lot.”

“Ya ain’t helpin’.”

Yuugi laughed then leaned over him to smile at Ryou. “So, how did your date go?”

“Oh, it went great!”

“Did he have-”

“No.”

“Oh.” Yuugi leaned back and picked up his coffee mug. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. I knew he didn’t. I’m seeing him again next week.”

Yuugi blinked and set the mug down. “Why?”

Joey looked up at Ryou and tried not to spit out his food when Ryou tilted his head to the side with a weird grin. “Why not? He’s hot. I’m not breaking up with him because of that.”

“But he’s not your soulmate.”

“So?” Then Ryou smiled normally like he suddenly realized something. “Oh you must not understand. When I said ‘he’s hot’ I meant he’s _hooooooot._ ”

Duke wiggled his eyebrows. “Well if that’s the case, I want his number.”

Ryou wrinkled his nose, sitting up straight. “And you must not understand either. _I’m_ dating him.”

“And?”

“Tristan, deal with your boyfriend.” Yuugi groaned and rolled his eyes.

“Sure.” He gestured to Duke with his thumb and leaned back against him. “Give him the number Ryou. I want to play League this weekend.”

“You’re all the worst!” 

“So what I'm hearing is we’re all doing normal. Joey still doesn't have a job, Yuugi’s still boyfriendless and Ryou’s still playing the field.” Tristan clinked his paper coffee cup against Yuugi’s mug and lifted it. “Happy Tuesday.”

“Happy Tuesday.”

Joey finished eating his food and glanced up when he took a drink. Just outside the cafe was a girl talking on her phone, a guy ran up to her and gently put his hand on her shoulder. When she turned to face him, it looked like she didn't know who he was, but he smiled at her like he’d known her his whole life. He took her free hand in his and lifted it up, mouthing something and she dropped the phone, wrapping her arms around his neck. Joey smiled, watching them have the first of what he was sure would be a lifetime of hugs. It wasn't very often he saw that. More often than not, someone would walk up, say ‘hey we have the string thing’ and the other would respond with ‘oh’. Sure, there were die hard saps out there like Yuugi, and apparently like this couple, but more and more he saw people refusing to follow a predetermined destiny, more like Ryou. So moments like this were nice. He wondered what the person on the end of his string thought. If meeting them would be like this or would he get an ‘oh’. 

Yuugi shifted on the seat beside him, sighing. He wanted to tell him he didn't have anything to worry about, but what did he know?

\---

A week later and Kaiba decided the string wasn’t at the top of his ‘to maim and kill list’, it was Mokuba. He was going to make him ask for his help. That was his plan all along. For a week, he wasn’t falling for it. He could deal with it himself. If for no other reason than to wipe that giddy smile Mokuba wore the entire time off his smug little face, but today it was worse than all the days before. Like the string was brighter red or maybe thicker, and it was everywhere; warm, pulsing, annoying. He couldn’t get away from it. He tried to put it up over the chairs and up on his desk to get out of it, but after tripping on it five times and finally falling because of it, he’d had enough. “Fine!”

He stormed out of his office, down the stairs into the living room where Mokuba sat cross legged on the floor playing a video game. He didn't acknowledge Kaiba’s presence in the room save for a casual remark to his online gamer friends over the head set. “Brb guys. If I don’t come back in an hour send a search party. Big brother might’ve shipped me to Shanghai.” He took the headset off and smiled up at him. “What’s up?”

“Don’t play dumb. You know how to fix this. Fix it!”

Mokuba’s giddy grin softened and he tilted his head. “I can’t ‘fix it’. It’s not broken.”

“What good are you then?”

Mokuba laughed at his frustration and stood up. “Are you asking for my help or not?”

Kaiba grit his teeth and dug his nails into his palms. “I don’t....”

“‘You don’t’ what?”

“Fine. Help me.”

Mokuba started to say something then waved him off, walking towards the kitchen. “Close enough.” 

Kaiba followed him, confused when he hopped up on a barstool and opened his laptop. “What are you doing?”

“Showing you what I think will help.” He patted the stool beside him and waited until Kaiba moved into the kitchen and sat down. “I know why you're having a lot of problems and you’re not going to like it.”

“Does it mean I’m dying?”

Mokuba laughed, shaking his head. “No.” Then he dramatically clasped his hands to his chest and said as mockingly as he could muster, “It’s just a way of showing you how strong your loving bond is with your soulmate!” He laughed at Kaiba’s expense then leaned on the kitchen island, nodding. “Though to be fair, that is the theory, but I wanted to show you something.”

He clicked on an open window and Kaiba groaned, “Not this.”

“Come on. Just hear me out. I know this is usually for a bunch of fruit baskets but… there’s some good stuff in here. It’s not all ‘happily ever after’ mooshy stuff. Actually, most of what I’ve read is the opposite.”

Kaiba frowned and read over Mokuba’s shoulder at the front page. It was a social media site specifically for talking about the damn string. People post pictures of their string hoping to catch someone to actually see it as well as brag about it etc., but what he saw was more like what Mokuba said: people complaining about how it was taking over their lives or about the strings breaking. Breaking? So they did break. “I don’t understand.” He pulled the laptop away from Mokuba and read over a post from some woman about her string breaking and being unable to fix it. “I just-”

“Literally tried to cut it with a machete and your full body weight and this poor girl tripped on it and... Yeah.”

“So if I leave it all over the floor and trip I could break it?" Kaiba muttered to himself, "That shouldn’t be hard. I trip on it all the time.”

Mokuba groaned and fell on the counter.

“What?”

“No! You’re not doing that.”

“Why not?”

“Because I want you to be happy!” 

“I’d be happy without it.”

“That’s not the point.” Mokuba took the laptop back and started clicking through the site, his brows knit together and his lips in a thin line. 

“I don’t understand why you won't let me break it. Are you trying to tell me you’re buying into this bullshit?”

“What if the person on the other end of that string is the best thing that’s ever happened to you?”

“And what if they’re a no account idiot leach who will try to destroy everything we’ve built together?”

“Seto I’ve looked through this site backwards and forwards for ways to help you cut that string because I’m 100% with you and with those people on there. No one tells us what our fate is. We make our own fate. We take responsibility for our own lives. We live that. We came up from nothing and no one can say it was just handed to us. We did this on our own so I get it, but,” Mokuba sighed and spun to face him on the stool, “doing this ourselves kinda sucks.”

Kaiba sighed through his nose and looked at the screen.

“I haven't found anyone anywhere on this whole site that met the person on the end of the string and decided they didn’t love them.”

“If that’s the case, why refuse it?”

“Lots of reasons. Some people are messed up and you can love them all you want, but it doesn’t change the fact they’re messed up. Some people have other things they want, other people they want. It’s not… it’s not black and white, but if you have a ridiculously annoying red string that’s taking up so much of your attention you want to cut off your own hand, I’m going to go out on a limb and say it probably doesn't have a blood sucking moron at the end of it.”

“It could.”

“True. I don’t know Seto, maybe that’s your thing.” Kaiba quickly shoved Mokuba’s shoulder making the bar stool teeter until Mokuba grabbed the counter to steady himself. He laughed and shrugged, sitting back in it right. “So… I have an idea for whenever you’re done trying to kill yourself or cut off your hand. And after you laugh your head off and sleep on it, I think you’d like it.”

Kaiba looked at him and he pulled up a video from one of the posts. It was a girl (a-ditzy-hippie-fully-bought-into-the-soulmates-bullshit-girl) and even her voice gave him a headache, but he watched it with Mokuba since apparently this was a little more important to him than he’d realized. She talked about different ways to actually _use_ the string. That… was something he hadn’t thought about. Before he could comment on the video, Mokuba showed him what his idea was. 

He was right. He laughed.

\---

Joey finally got a job! Just when the cold was getting to be too much and he was running out of candles, he finally got a job. It was a good job too. He was an IT help desk assistant for one of Kaiba Corporations branches that he still wasn’t sure what they did exactly. Not that it mattered, he had a job. After a month or so of working there, he decided he liked his boss: Mai Valentine. She was gorgeous, like straight out of a pin up magazine gorgeous, and she made a point to flirt with him every shift he had with her. She asked him out on a date, well, conned him into asking her out and he was excited about it even though he knew she wasn’t the one on the other end of the thread. He didn’t tell Yuugi. He already knew his opinion on it. 

They decided to meet at her favorite restaurant and he was a little late since he had to work later than he’d planned. She seemed to know that when he sat down at the table she had reserved for them. “Sorry I-”

“I get it, sugar. Work sucks.” She lifted a glass of wine to her lps and took a sip. 

“Yeah, but it pays so…” he shrugged, “can’t complain.”

“Very true.”

“So whatcha like ‘bout this place?”

She looked around the restaurant and then back at him winking. “They don’t skimp on their drinks.”

He laughed. That sounded like her. “Food any good?”

“I’m sure you’ll love it. You eat everything.”

“Ha! Yeah.”

The waiter came by and he ordered a ton of food, she ordered more drinks and they spent the next few hours talking about work about his sister and mom and about her new apartment in the city. He was having a good time, except the string… it kept gnawing at him, like he was doing something wrong or somewhere he shouldn't be. No matter what he did he couldn’t shake the feeling like he was cheating on whoever it was on the other end of the string. How did Ryou do this all the time? 

When he finished eating and she’d had her last drink, he took her back to her place. She led him inside, showing him around and he was honestly surprised she wasn’t as drunk as he would be if he drank that much. She was perfectly fine, grabbing another glass of wine from her kitchen and leading him into the living room to sit down. She said something about a new sofa and while he was looking at it she set the wine glass down on the coffee table. “It’s real nice. I’m surprised it’s new, ya know? It’s really comfy.”

She chuckled and kneeled on the sofa. She leaned over him, putting her hands on his shoulders to push him back. He stared up at her sultry grin, unable to breathe. “Still needs to be broken in.”

She leaned down and kissed him, climbing into his lap and like hell was he going to let this go to waste. He kissed her back, sliding his hands over her thighs, hiking up her skirt and squeezed her hips. He felt like he was living his fantasy when his fingers twitched. Once, twice, three times. The string. Little twitches at first, then nagging tugs like someone was adamantly trying to get his attention. He moved his hand, sliding over her back and pulling her closer to him, but that just made it worse. Worse to the point he had to stop.

He gently pushed her back, muttering under his breath when she broke the kiss. She sat back on the sofa staring at him like he’d lost his mind and damn if he hadn’t. Who says no to someone this fucking gorgeous?! Him apparently.

“I-I’m sorry Mai. It’s-”

She smirked and looked down at his hand, still fucking twitching. “Huh. Didn’t think you were the romantic kind.”

He blushed. He knew it. Could feel it in his ears. “It ain’t like that. I just-”

“Ain’t like that,” she mocked, still smirking. “So what’s it like then? Have nerve damage in your hand?”

He sighed and lifted his hand. Flexing his fingers he still felt the pulls and tugs, but not as much as before. “Nah.”

“So?” She shrugged and leaned back on the sofa, resting her head on her arm. 

He huffed, shaking his head at his hand and dropped it into his lap. “I’m sorry. I should probably go.”

“You have nothing to be sorry about, sugar. You’re not the first one this happened to, won’t be the last.”

“Still sucks.”

She nodded, smiling lazily at him. 

“Why ain’t it botherin’ ya?”

She looked down at her hand, fanning out her fingers to see her immaculately painted nails. She wiggled them then looked back up at him. “I chose to leave mine behind. Can’t upset someone who isn’t there.”

He wanted to ask why she did that, but it wasn’t any of his business. He should really leave. Mai wasn’t on that page though, whether from the wine or something else, he didn’t know. 

“This is where you ask why?”

“It ain't my business what ya do Mai. Ya know what you’re doin’.”

She laughed and leaned forward, surprising the shit out of him by kissing him again. “Whoever’s on the other side of that string better treat you right or they’ll have me to deal with.” She laughed again and he told himself she’d had way more to drink than she was letting on for her to say something like that. Her gaze swept over him., “I was like you. Couldn’t even look at anyone without feeling like I was the worst person ever. Then I met _him._ ”

“Was he an asshole or somethin’?”

She shook her head, smiling sadly. “No. He was _perfect_. Like, crafted just for me kind of perfect. I’ll never… I don’t think I’ll ever meet anyone like him again.”

Joey shifted on the sofa so he was leaning back more comfortably and she reached out for her wine glass again.

“We were something for a while there. Going to parties, tearing up the town. We had fun. But at some point, we started having too much fun. You know how it is? It’s difficult to chase the next high when you’re never satisfied.” She leaned back with a huff and took a sip of wine. “After a while we ended up where we shouldn’t be. Fun was over. I knew I needed help, but he did not and it didn’t matter what I did or what I said, I couldn’t change his mind. So I left.” Mai hummed and smiled up at the ceiling. “I used to think I was that ride or die girl and when I’d find my soulmate I wouldn’t let him go for anything. Turns out, I’m not.”

“Don’t say that, Mai. Ain’t your fault.” He smiled when Mai slid over to lay against him. 

“Maybe not, but my point is, don’t be sorry for believing in it. Go with your gut, Romeo.”

\---

He hated Mokuba for suggesting it, hated himself for going along with it and hated the stupid damned string for putting him in this situation in the first place. Mokuba seemed to be having a blast. He bought blue yarn and crochet hooks and sat with Kaiba on the floor in the living room with the laptop between them and a video on how to crochet pulled up and playing. Once they got the basics down, they started looking up different things to make. Unwittingly, Kaiba settled on what was supposed to be a joke. 

Mokuba flipped through patterns of hats, scarves, blankets, shoes, gloves; you name it, he looked through it, but Kaiba didn't want to make something to wear. It was bad enough it was touching his hand. Mokuba jokingly suggested crocheting a puppy, and Kaiba JOKINGLY countered with ‘if he was going to make something like that, he’d make a dragon’. Two days later, he found himself crocheting a small dragon into the red string. It had to look stupid, waving his hands around, wrapping the string only he could see around his fingers and the hook, but Mokuba never said anything. They did that for days, weeks, and a month before Kaiba took the hook with him to work. While he sat in his office looking over reports, he added more to it. Two months later (a minute before a board meeting), he had a fully crocheted red dragon about a foot tall with wings and everything.

He did what Mokuba suggested, but it didn’t stop the twinges or the tugs or the warmth or the mess. All it did was add a little red dragon to the chaos. It didn’t help. After all, he still felt it and was still annoyed by it, so he decided to unravel it. Unfortunately, he realized he couldn’t yet. He had a board meeting and he was late. Rushing off to the meeting room, he kept glancing down behind him at the little red dragon, seemingly walking on a red leash down the hall. It... almost made it worth it. 

He was the last to enter the meeting room and nodded curtly before taking his seat at the end of the table. He waited until Atem was presenting again before sneakily picking up the red dragon to unravel it. No one noticed. Even if they did, what were they going to say? But holding it in his hands, he noticed something else that made it almost worth it; the dragon was warm to the touch, pulsing and twitching as if it were alive. Everything he hated about the string, was endearing to the little red dragon. He set it on the board room table and looked up at Atem’s presentation, trying to keep a straight face when it would inch slowly across the table and he’d have to pull it back. 

The presentation went by just like it did last time, maybe even worse than before. Kaiba didn’t remember a damn word he said and he was sure the others didn’t hear him either. Not that Atem seemed phased. After everyone flooded out of the board room, he packed up his things. This time Kaiba noticed he wasn’t as uncaring about his movements. He kept flexing his left hand, picking up his things with the other. He couldn’t ask him about it, but that didn’t mean he couldn't ask him about anything.

“So you moved to this because you were bored?”

Atem glanced up and forced a polite smile. “Yes.”

“Are you sure you didn’t move to this because you wanted to be bored?”

He snickered and shook his head, “Seems that way.”

“Why don’t you move to a different department?”

Atem responded, staring down at the briefcase and flexing his left hand, “Which one, Mr. Kaiba? They’re all pretty full.”

“Which one do you want to be part of?”

Atem stopped flexing his hand and closed the briefcase, meeting his gaze. “CEO would be nice.”

Kaiba stood up and smirked, walking towards the door with Atem not far behind him. “I'm afraid that one’s unavailable. Even if you managed to kill me, Mokuba’s gunning for it as well.”

Atem snickered, “I didn’t know you had a sense of humor.”

He walked up the elevator and pressed the button, glancing over at Atem unknowingly standing beside the little red dragon. He really needed to unravel it. “Again, what position do you want?”

“Well,” he sighed, looking up at the increasing numbers above the door, “I first applied here as an Art Director 5 years ago, but the hiring manager moved me somewhere else and I’ve hopped departments since then.”

“I’ll look into it.”

The doors opened and Atem quirked a brow, walking into it. “Not that I’m complaining, but why?”

He followed him into the elevator and turned. “No one listens to those presentations.” When Atem nodded, partly in agreement and partly taking it as a criticism, Kaiba continued, reaching out to press the lobby button, “You’re the only Data analyst in the company I know the name of. You shouldn’t be in that department.”

Kaiba’s attention was split between Atem and twisting the string around his finger to pull the dragon inside the elevator as the doors closed. He wondered what would happen if they did and it wasn’t in the elevator with him. Could be nothing, or he could actually lose an arm. The doors closed just as it waddled over the threshold and Atem shifted, facing him. “Ms. Valentine did say something about the department being where careers go to die.”

Kaiba tisked, fighting a smile at the dragon. The elevator doors opened and Atem stepped out, making his way back to Data. When their paths split, he turned and smiled politely again. “See you in a month, Mr. Kaiba.”

“Hopefully not.”

He left the building, meeting Roland outside in front of the limo. “Young Mr. Kaiba sent me to pick you up, sir.”

He nodded once and climbed into the limo, pulling the string with him so the dragon was inside before Roland could shut the door. He kept his eyes on him until he was out of sight towards the drivers door and then looked down at the red dragon by his feet. He picked it up and started to unravel it, but movement in the limo caught his attention. Mokuba scooted over on the other side, beaming at him. “Sooo… did it work? You seem like you’re in a better mood.”

Kaiba kept his gaze on him and pulled the string, unraveling the wing. “It passed the time.”

“What’d you make?”

“None of your business.”

“Ah huh… come on. Tell me.” 

“I already told you.”

“No you di-” Mokuba sucked in a sharp breath and lurched across the limo grabbing his hands and stopping him from unraveling the rest of the wing. “You made a dragon! Urgh! I want to see it. I bet it’s adorable.”

“Let go.”

“No! The whole point was to make something.”

“No, the point was to get my mind off of it. It served its purpose.”

Mokuba huffed and sat back, watching him unravel the dragon; well, watching him move his hands around unraveling an imaginary dragon. He glanced up at him, feeling like he needed to explain himself or let Mokuba know it wasn’t a failure, but decided instead to change the subject. “Do we have any Art Director positions open for our upcoming games?”

Mokuba looked up, crossing his arms over his chest. “Depends. Do we have one open? No. Do we need to do a complete overhaul of Duel Monsters? Hell yeah and you already know how I feel about Iko.”

He snickered, pulling on the red string and winding it around his fingers. “I want Atem Sennen moved to that project. If he can salvage it, I want him head of production.” 

Mokuba blinked, then grinned. “Isn’t that the guy from legal?”

Kaiba nodded, pulling more string.

“Not that I'm arguing because I completely agree, he’s not being utilized properly, but how did he jump from legal to you wanting him in production?”

“He jumped from Legal to Data.”

Mokuba winced, sucking in a sharp breath. “Oh shit. Who’d he piss off?”

“The right person,” he said, watching the loops in the dragon's head unravel, “They had him presenting monthly and quarterly stats to the board. He’s the only one who’s presented data that I don’t remember any of his presentations.”

“That’s saying something. To be fair though, you’ve been distracted with that.” 

“I never hear all of it, I’m not going to pretend like I do, but I don’t remember any of his at all.”

“Not seeing how being utterly forgettable means he should be head of production.”

“That’s not what I said. I said I don't remember the presentation. I have full confidence he knows what he’s talking about and is handling it. I have no need to listen to it.”

“And?”

“And when I asked him what position in the company he wanted, he said mine.”

“I like him a lot already. I’ll get him moved over tomorrow.”

He nodded and stopped unraveling the dragon. Staring down at what was left of its feet and tail, he didn’t want to admit it, but he changed his mind.

\---

Yuugi packed up a box while Joey tried to get ready for work. “Thanks Yuug’. Ya got no idea how much I appreciate ya doin’ this for me. I’ll run back here after my shift and I won’t take any shit ‘bout stayin’ late either. I gotta get outta here before the lease is up and that asshole locks me out,” he said, throwing on the stupid polo he had to wear, and turned to see him frowning at the box and refusing to use his left hand to pick anything up; holding it tight to his chest. “Ya hurt your wrist or somethin’?”

“Huh?”

He gestured to him, walking around him to pick up his work shoes from the ground. 

Yuugi sighed and sat down on the bed slowly, watching him walk over to sit next to him. “No my wrist isn’t hurt.”

“So what’s up?” Joey asked, sliding on his shoes, not looking up.

“Just a lot on my mind.”

“Ah huh,” He stomped his foot on the ground making sure his shoe was on good enough and bent back down to tie it. “A lot that’s gotta do with the string thing, right?”

“When isn’t it?” Yuugi laughed at himself and blew his bangs up out of his face. “I just feel really stupid.”

“Ha! Well at least ya just feel stupid in fronta me. I feel like a fuckin’ moron in fronta Mai and the whole team at work and I gotta work with them almost every fuckin’ day. Nothin’s better than walkin’ inta work and havin’ the whole fuckin’ room sayin’ ‘hey Romeo’ every goddamn day.”

Yuugi giggled and nudged him. “I’m sorry.”

“Eh. I’ve dealt with worse.”

“You really have. So have I.” Yuugi stood up and picked up his alarm clock from his night stand, wrapping the cord around it. He eyed Joey then put it in the box. “I still can't believe you went on that date in the first place.”

Joey snorted and stood up to get his jacket from the closet. “Mai’s persuasive and I didn’t think it’d be a big deal.”

“Cause of Ryou?”

“Nah, just in general.” He lifted his hand and took the thread in his other hand, wrapping it around his arm since he had his jacket on now. He snickered, feeling it twinge and pulse softly on his hand since his jacket was too thick to feel it through. “I never thought about it before.”

“You’ve never thought about the person on the other end of your string?”

“Nope.” He shrugged. “Figure they’ll show up when they wanna.”

Yuugi looked him over and tilted his head to the side. “You really aren’t worried about it, are you?”

“Nah, why?”

His lips pulled into a disbelieving smile. “That’s what I want to know. Why? Why aren’t you worried? You’re happy with just that?”

Yes. He was. It sounded stupid now that he was about to say it out loud though. So he tried to make more sense of it and raked his hand through his hair pulling it back. “It ain’t that crazy. I mean, It’s not like I’m in a good spot ta be with anyone. I’m just now movin’ outta this dump. Three months ago, I didn’t have electricity.” Yuugi bristled like he was accusing him of something and he quickly tried to recover. “I ain’t blamin’ ya or complainin’ about it, just sayin’ it like it is. I didn’t want your help with it, ‘member?”

“Yeah, but I still feel like a horrible friend.”

“For what? Me bein’ a stubborn idiot? Heh. If anythin’, ya really should get better friends. Fuck.”

Yuugi giggled and shook his head.

“I- I dunno. I got a roof over my head and I got food on the table. Got a good family, good friends and I got this.” He shrugged his shoulders, smiling to himself. “I ain’t alone. Sure things can always get better, but ya know what? I ain’t missin’ anythin’. I’m doin’ pretty good. I’m really lucky.”

Yuugi looked away, frowning and continued packing up his stuff. Joey watched him, debating on making him talk to him and being late for work or putting a pin in this for later. Yuugi hummed, not facing him and picked up his race car magazines from the nightstand. “Thank you, Joey.”

He blinked. “...What'd I do?”

Yuugi turned and smiled, waving him out of the room. “You’re late. Go away! I’m going to be mad if you’re not here a 7 like you said.”

He laughed and walked out the door, guiltily leaving his best friend to do what he should be doing. The walk to work wasn’t bad. It’d be better from his new place. He couldn’t wait to get out of his old one. Stepping in the door, he almost ran right into Mai. She laughed and shoved his shoulder gently. “Watch where you’re going, Romeo.” 

He started to apologize, but she pulled him into the room, gesturing to a table with cake and take-out. “What’s all this?”

“Atem’s moving departments tomorrow. We’re throwing him a ‘getting the fuck out of here’ party.”

A voice he’d never heard before spoke up from the hallway to their right. “Appropriate work language, Mai.”

They turned to the voice, and Joey realized he’d never seen him before. Which was weird, mai introduced him to everyone there. Must be one of the guys on the other side of the building in Data analysis. They usually worked out of the office. She laughed and put her hand on her hip. “Since when do I ‘appropriate work’ anything?” 

“I’m going to pretend like I don't know any of that either,” he said, shaking his head at her when she walked up to him, arms out to hug him. He snickered and relented. “Since it’s my last day, I’ll let this slide too.”

She hugged him uncomfortably long (on purpose), then stepped back; reveling in his discomfort as she flipped her hair over her shoulder. “So, big shot Art Director now, huh? How’d you manage that one? Wowed them with your data skills?”

“I’m pretty sure I actually bored someone to their death with that ‘wowed performance’. They’re all so old.” He laughed with her then turned his attention to Joey. “Oh, I’m sorry. I don’t believe we’ve met yet. I’m Atem Sennen”

Joey grinned when he held his hand out to him. He liked this guy. “Joey Wheeler. Not that it’s gonna matter if you’re movin’ though, huh?”

Atem smiled. “It still matters.”

“You already know all about him, Atem,” Mai purred. “This is Romeo.”

Joey groned and glared at her. “I'm gonna need ta leave the country, ain’t I?”

“Probably. I know a lot of people.” Mai winked at him then looked at Atem. “When are you getting out of here?”

“I’m off at 5. I’ll come by again before I leave, I promise.”

“Good, cause right now Romeo’s twenty minutes late and we should let him clock in.”

“Hey! I was on time!”

“Yeah, on time if your shift started ten minutes ago not twenty.”

He grumbled and walked around her to the help desk to clock in. While he did that Mai started talking to Atem again. “So, how’s tall, dark, and handsome?”

“Approp- you know what, you’re not bringing me down to your level today.”

“My level?” She laughed, leaning back against the counter. “AlI I asked was how Mr. Kaiba was doing?”

“By calling him tall, dark, and handsome?”

“Ooo so you agree?” When Atem glared at her, she winked. “Well if that’s the case, when you see him tomorrow night, give that asshole a kiss for me.”

“That’s a thousand times worse.”

She mockingly put her hand on her chest like she was offended and gasped. “Atem! You have such a dirty mind. You should really keep that in check at your new big shot job. Mr. Kaiba would not appreciate that kind of talk. Well... unless you're already kissing his ass.”

Joey bit the inside of his cheek to keep from laughing. Mai did not need any help. Atem looked absolutely _mortified_ and started to argue with her, then scowled; turning on his heel to walk away from her growing laughter. She shook her head and turned to face him patting her hand on the counter. “God I love this job. Don’t you, Romeo?” 

He glared at her, feeling his blush in his ears. She got him too. 

\---

It took a few months to remake the one he’d unraveled. It was bigger, maybe a foot and a half tall and a little fatter. He liked it more. This one didn’t have string in the wrong places. He managed to make it completely while hiding the unbreakable string and he was proud of it. That being said, it was still strange walking around with a waddling crocheted dragon behind him. Well, not strange, just distracting. He had a hard time not laughing and keeping a straight face throughout the day. Every time he looked at it, it gave him a good feeling he hadn’t had in awhile. 

That being said, moments like this, he wished it wasn’t there. Mokuba and Atem sat in the boardroom with him discussing the gaming project Kaiba put him on. Even with Atem on it, they weren’t any further ahead, but this meeting wasn’t called by him. It was called by Atem and he was curious to see where it was going. Since it was a more important issue, he kept the dragon on the floor near the leg of his chair. It couldn’t distract him there.

Mokuba blinked at Atem. “Wow. Are you sure?” 

“I'm positive,” he said, “This project will not meet production if you keep him on the team.”

“Why? I mean. How can one guy really slow things down?”

Atem sighed, strained and weary like just asking that question added 200 pounds to his shoulders. “He,” Atem licked his lips and his brows knit together briefly like he was trying to choose a better way to say something. Kaiba thought it was a waste of time. He should just say what he meant to say. He wasn't going to hurt anyone's delicate sensibilities in this room. “He brings his out of work sphere into his work sphere and vice versa creating deep lasting problems with the rest of the team.”

Mokuba deadpanned, then shrugged his shoulders. “So he’s what? Getting drunk and partying or sleeping with everyone?”

Atem blinked, shocked by how forward Mokuba was, then recovered, smiling. “Both.”

“Ahhh. So who else are you wanting off then?”

“Just him. I'm certain once he’s off the team it will run smoother.”

“So you want me to fire him?”

“Frankly, yes. He’s the shittiest animator I’ve ever run across. I don’t know how he’s on Duel Monsters in the first place.”

Kaiba quirked a brow at him, then hummed, “That’s probably why we had problems with the last three production runs.”

“Yeah. If he’s the reason everything’s glitching out. He must be sleeping with more than just the team to keep that from us.” Mokuba laughed and wrote something down then looked up at Atem. “So we good now?”

Atem took a deep breath and sighed, “No. That’s just the good news.”

Mokuba groaned and flopped on the table, making Atem snicker. “Should we scrap it?”

“No, but we have to redo almost everything. I tried correcting things from the point they were at, but the more I corrected the further back the problems were originating. Then I found out they decided Mr. Kaiba didn't know what he was talking about and ran the rejected storyboard.”

Kaiba felt his eye twitch. “Fire all of them.”

“Cancel Duel Monsters. Got it.”

He shook his head. “No, not yet. Do you think you can get it finished by the deadline, Atem?”

He was taken back by that and frowned at the table, murmuring under his breath then pursed his lips looking back up. “Yes. If I can find good people to do it.”

“You have a month to bring people in. If you can’t find what you need, I’ll move Brek and Tanaka over to assist you.”

“Oooo Martin’s going to be pissed if you do that. He’s almost finished.”

“I don’t give a damn what he thinks about it. Brek owes me a favor anyway.”

“Alright. Anything else going to hell?”

He snickered and shook his head. “Not yet.”

“Good I have one more question for you.” He pointed to Atem's hand and smirked. “So what do you do with your thread?”

Atem pulled his hands off the table, hiding them and stared at Mokuba like he’d asked him to tell him his darkest secret. Not that Kaiba was really paying too much attention to that. He was focused on being shocked Mokuba would ask that. “You can’t ask that, Mokuba.”

“Sure I can. He’s a friend-” Mokuba kept smiling at him and bundled up the papers he had- “and I think it’s really cool how all of you do something different. Seriously, I can’t wait. My 16th birthday is going to be the best one ever! I have a list of ideas.”

“Who else have you asked that?”

“Everyone in Data where Atem came from. Like the whole building.”

Atem laughed, shaking his head, “That’s a good place to do that.”

“Right?! They all talked about it for hours. It was great. Best time I ever had down there. They even answered for their coworkers who were off the day I came by. No shame. None.” Mokuba scooted at the end of his seat, staring Atem down. “Soooooo?”

“I do the same thing Margret does.”

“Ahhhhh. Same reason why?”

He nodded. 

“Great.”

And just like that, Mokuba was back at the top of his maim and kill list.

\---

After a few weeks of the little dragon following him around, he sat in bed with it resting in the crook of his knee and the string to unravel it in his hand. It was warm; pulsed and twitched on the bed and between his fingers like a heart string. He wanted to unravel it, wanted to keep it, wanted to cut the string, and worried about what would happen if he did. He sat there, staring at it for he didn't know how long until he heard a soft knock at his bedroom door. Looking up at Mokuba popping his head in, he sighed, “What are you doing up?”

“Well I was waiting for you to not be busy and look at that. You’re not.” He frowned, watching Mokuba walk to the room and hop up on the bed. He looked at his hand then up to his eyes and smiled. “So are you going to ask me about Atem’s thread or not?”

“Not.”

“You want to know.”

“It’s not my business.”

“Yeah, it’s not at all, but you really want to know.” 

He sighed through his nose and dropped his hand on the bed. Yes, he did want to know, but he wasn’t going to ask and he couldn’t corner him with this one. He didn't need to know, he just wanted to know. So he lifted his hand back up, dropping his glare from Mokuba to the dragon and pulled on the string. He didn’t get a single loop undone when Mokuba grabbed his hand.

“I’m talking to you.”

“You’re attempting to blackmail me.”

“And I failed so now I'm talking to you.” Mokuba giggled. “I’ll tell you about Margret first so you got an idea. She’s like 100 years old and she doesn't have the thread anymore. Her husband died 20 years ago, I think. I’m pretty sure that’s what she told me. Anyway she has string wrapped around her hand exactly like she did when he was alive. It’s like a knuckle-less glove. She’s got it woven over all her fingers, which is pretty impressive since she’s got arthritis and everything else. She said she does that because it always felt to her like he was holding her hand through everything.”

“Why are you telling me that?”

“Because Atem has the thread wrapped around his hand with the sole purpose of feeling like he has someone holding his hand throughout the day.”

Kaiba stared at him, processed it, but was still confused. “And?”

“And you should know because he’s the only one I know of that you have some shred of respect for.”

_“Had.”_

Mokuba laughed and shook his head. “See what I mean? What I'm trying to get through to you is, it’s okay to keep the dragon. It’s making you feel better and you can’t lie to my face and say it’s not. I’m getting _terrified_ pleas for help from the whole building thinking you're about to go postal on everyone because you’re in a noticeable good mood. No one has self respect when it comes to this. You just have to own it.”

Kaiba sat there, taking in what Mokuba said and how he sat on the bed beaming up at him with the confidence of a trusted expert when he didn't even have the string yet. He shook his head, smiling back at him. “You don’t have to deal with this. I’ll figure it out.”

“Ha! Probably not. If it keeps me from coming home one day to find you stuck, dangling from the ceiling or missing a hand, I’m alright with this.”

“It wasn’t that bad.”

“I came home to you hanging from a machete wedged in the door. Yes it was that bad.” Mokuba shrugged his shoulders. “Sides. You help me out all the time with _everything_ no questions asked. This is the one thing I can do to help you. I’ve got your back, Seto.”

“I know you do.” He reached out scooping Mokuba up into a big hug, forgetting about the string and the dragon. He was so focused on it, and so was Mokuba, trying to help him out with something he didn’t need to be worrying about yet. “Where’s my ‘no questions asked’ policy?”

“It’s going to be a while. We had to push back the release date 10 more years. Turns out we need something called ‘maturity’. It isn’t fully developed yet and ‘blackmail’ is too profitable to shut down.”

Kaiba let himself laugh, like he only did around Mokuba. 

\---

Joey looked out over the bridge at the sunset reflecting off the ocean. The view was so beautiful, he never got enough of it. That and the salty breeze coming in, the sound of the waves crashing against the bridge supports and seagulls flying below. His new apartment was a few blocks away and this was just another thing on the list of millions of things he loved about it. Yuugi grabbed his arm and pushed him ahead of him, making him look where he was going instead of the view. “Oh shit.” Yellow tape and cones blocked off half the path because of bent railing. “Thanks, Yuug'.”

“No problem.”

“So, hey uh, it’s gonna be dark soon.”

“Yeah I know but… Just one more block?”

Joey smiled, shaking his head at Yuugi. Like he’d done for the last 5 years, they walked around the city when it was nice outside. It was good exercise, but Yuugi wasn’t doing it for that. He was looking again and Joey wasn’t going to rain on his parade. “Ya owe me ice cream or somethin’.”

“Deal! There’s an ice cream shop right up ahead at the end of the bridge. Then we’ll head back.”

“Sure. Sounds like a plan.”

They walked across the bridge to the ice cream shop on the other side and waited in the long line. It was summer, ice cream was a popular thing. Especially here. It’s the best ice cream in the city and a popular spot for joggers and tourists crossing the bridge. They waited in the long line and when they got their ice cream, sat at a small table near the shop to eat it. He joked around with Yuugi, talked to him about his job and his new place. He loved it. Really felt like his life turned around. It helped that Yuugi was feeling better too. After that talk he’d had with him in his old apartment, Yuugi started wearing his hair different. Told him he was tired of seeing the string laying around everywhere and he needed it to be more out of sight out of mind, so he tied it up in his hair. Not that Joey could see exactly what he did, but he could see the braids and kinks where ties would be. He told him that Joey’s appreciation for what he had instead of being upset about what he didn't have reminded him to do the same. Yuugi also said he finished up his game design degree and was anxiously awaiting news back from some of the places he’d applied to. 

“Ya actually applied ta Kaiba Corp. for that?”

“Sure! Why not?”

“No one gets hired there.”

“You got hired there.”

“Nah that ain’t the same thing. Ask Mai. They just need bodies at my job. They don't care who’s there. They care who’s on their stuff that matters.”

Yuugi playfully narrowed his eyes and leaned on the table, pointing his spoon at him. “Are you trying to say I’m not good enough to work there?”

“No! Nah I'm just sayin’ the CEO’s an asshole.”

“You haven’t met him.”

“Nope. Don’t need ta. We’ve been hard core Duel Monsters nerds for fuckin’ years. We know what he’s like.”

Yuugi giggled and shrugged his shoulders. “That is true, but people can surprise you, you know?”

Joey snorted. Not that asshole. He tossed the plastic spoon in his empty ice cream bowl and leaned back. “Now that I’m thinkin’ ‘bout it, I know someone who’s in there. Maybe I can get Mai ta put your name through ta him.”

Yuugi lit up and gasped, “Are you serious?”

“Yeah. He’s an Art Directer for somethin’. He’d be the one ta talk ta. Dunno if it’ll work, but it’s worth a shot, right?”

“Definitely! Thanks Joey.” 

“Sure thing!”

Yuugi got up and grabbed their empty bowls. “So, it’s officially dark now. We’d better head back.”

He laughed, getting up too, and stretched, looking out at the bridge. Under the streetlights he thought he saw a familiar face walking towards them. “Speak of the devil.” 

Joey turned to get Yuugi’s attention, but he was trapped in a conversation with some tourists about which flavor was the best. He snickered and looked back out at Atem. He waved at him and Atem stopped, not recognizing him at first, then he smiled and waved. Joey started to walk towards him, figuring Yuugi would see him and catch up. He cupped his hands over his mouth and shouted, just in case Yuugi didn’t know where he was going, he’d know now. “Hey man! What’re ya doin’ out this way?”

He saw Atem laugh, but it was too quiet to reach him, then Atem yelled back, “Going home, Romeo.”

“Fuck you!”

He was going to kill Mai. Still walking towards Atem, he shielded his eyes from an oncoming car’s headlights when they hit a bum on the bridge. When he lowered his hand, he sucked in a sharp breath, not believing what he was seeing. The car was headed straight for Atem! As if that wasn’t bad enough, he was just passing the yellow tape and bent railing. He had nowhere to run. 

“Watch out!”

He broke out into a sprint on to the bridge, but there was no way he was going to make it to Atem before the car did. Not that it would’ve mattered. What was he going to do to stop a fucking car? But he ran anyway, watching helplessly as Atem turned and realized the danger he was in. The car corrected, but not before Atem had to jump back into the bent railing. It sped away, while Joey shouted at them about learning to fucking drive, seeing Yuugi maybe a few steps away from him, looking worried and completely confused. When he turned back to Atem, he looked white as a sheet, but fine. 

Atem took a deep breath, half laughed (which is probably what Joey would’ve done if he was in his shoes), and started to push away from the bent railing... when it gave out.

It just gave out, sending Joey bolting for him again. Tearing through what was left of the yellow tape and praying Atem managed to hold on to something so he didn't just watch someone he knew die right in front of him, he dropped to his knees on the edge of the bridge. He saw Atem holding onto the railing, but it wouldn’t hold out for long. It was probably stupid to do, but he wrapped the red string around the intact railing to help him reach for him. There was no way he’d get to him otherwise. He held his hand out and Atem looked up at him. He blinked, surprised, then grabbed his hand just as the railing shifted; breaking off from the bridge the rest of the way and falling into the waves below. The shift made Atem’s hand slip from Joey’s grip. He panicked and Atem panicked too, frantically reaching up with his other hand to make sure he didn’t slip the rest of the way out of his grip. 

He didn't make it to Joey’s hand though. Yuugi reached out to him and grabbed him, holding him solid enough for Joey to adjust his grip. “Hang on! We’ve got you.”

He looked over at Yuugi at his side helping him pull Atem up. If he wasn’t there this would’ve ended so much differently. Not that Atem was helping at all after Yuugi grabbed him. He was hanging off the fucking bridge and just suddenly became dead weight like he forgot what he was fucking doing. It pissed him off, but what was he going to do about it? Drop him? Somehow they pulled him up and backed away from the broken railing. Joey dramatically fell back on the concrete and groaned, glaring up at the black sky. “We ain’t goin’ on this bridge at night again. Fuck that was terrifyin’.” He huffed and weakly gestured to where he assumed Atem was. “Ya alright Atem?”

Atem didn’t answer him immediately. He was probably trying to catch his breath from almost dying twice in the last five minutes. Hell, he needed a minute and he wasn't the one dangling over the edge about to die. So he gave him some slack for that, but when he did say something, it made no sense. “I love your hair.”

Yuugi laughed, but it kind of sounded like he was crying and it made Joey sit up. Atem brushed his free hand over Yuugi’s hair and he leaned into his palm, murmuring, “Thank you.”

Yuugi still had his other hand in a death grip and they looked at each other like they’d known each other all their lives. Did- was… What?

“I planned on giving you trouble for taking so long to find me, but I think you’re right on time.”

He let go of Atem’s hand, wrapping his arms around his neck. “I was thinking the same thing.” 

Atem didn’t hesitate to pull him closer, holding him as tight as he could, still shaking from everything. Joey snickered while they completely ignored that he was there. Which was fine. He needed a breather anyway. That was terrifying. So he laid back down on the concrete staring up into the black sky. 

\---

Joey was really happy for Yuugi. He got hired pretty much on the spot working on their dream game for Kaiba corporation and when he wasn’t doing that, he was attached at Atem’s hip. Not that he blamed him. The few times he saw him in the months following the bridge incident, he was a glowing ball of sunshine. So when Yuugi and Atem invited him to Kaiba Corporation's gaming announcement conference that they always make a big production about, he couldn’t wait. Him and all their friends would be there and he couldn’t be happier or prouder of his best friend while he sat in the audience staring up at the stage with Atem and Yuugi standing side by side. 

Ryou giggled in the seat beside him. “They’re adorable together”

“I still can’t believe how they met,” Tristan commented, shaking his head. “It’s crazy.”

Joey nodded, still looking up at the stage. “Yeah. Give it a few years and they’ll forget I was even there.”

“Years? I give it till next month.” Ryou giggled. “You were just a prop.”

“Right? Fuck. I dunno why I bother.”

“It’s pretty romantic though. Can you imagine? You’re about to die and your soulmate just runs up and saves your life out of nowhere.” 

“Yeah. It’s somethin’.”

“How do you think you’ll meet yours, Joey?”

Joey blinked, frowned, then turned to Ryou’s delighted smile. “Since when do ya care ‘bout all that? I thought it was just a string?”

“I could be wrong. I’ve been wrong about tons of stuff before.” He shrugged and looked back up at the stage. “That and I'm bitter I don’t have one.”

Joey stared at him, completely dumbfounded. “Ya.. ya don’t?”

He shook his head and smiled sadly. “No. I did, but it broke a while ago. Just didn’t want to tell anyone.”

“Man… that sucks I’m sorry. Shit… Why’re ya tellin’ me now though?”

“Because Yuugi’s living the life up there and I want to make sure you don’t break yours.” He looked at him and took a deep shaky breath. “I guess it took this to realize that I did actually lose something and I needed to mourn it instead of ignore it. I’m better now.”

“I-uh… shit that just sucks.” Joey shifted in the seat and turned to face Ryou, pulling him into a big hug making him laugh.

Tristan leaned over and laughed. “Group hug!”

“Wait-”

Too late, Duke and Tristan hugged Ryou too and now they were getting dirty looks from everyone with how loud they were. He didn’t care. If he and Yuugi would’ve known, they could’ve helped him or at the very least Yuugi wouldn’t make him feel bad about dating. When Yuugi finds out about this he’s going to feel like dirt. 

He felt a sharp wack on the top of his head and jumped back, glaring at Tea standing up over them. “It’s starting. Shhhh!”

Tristan leaned over Ryou whispering to him even when Tea hit him three times to get him to stop. Joey laughed softly and looked up at the stage. With the auditorium quietish, Atem addressed the crowd announcing the new installment of Duel Monsters and introduced a new team on it, talking about additions and giving each one of the team that made the additions credit for it. At the end, like they always did, the CEO would announce the new stuff Kaiba corp had in the works. Joey was 100% sure the guy did this just for the flashing lights and feeling like he was king of the world. Most gaming companies didn’t do this, but Kaiba Corporation made a production of everything they did. No, Seto Kaiba made a big production out of everything he did. He might love Duel Monsters and thought Kaiba Corp. was actually a pretty decent company but that guy was a narcissistic bastard. 

He stewed in the dark, staring up at the brightly lit stage as Seto Kaiba walked onto it. That was… until he saw a little red blob waddling behind him. Joey frowned, squinting up at the stage. What the hell was that? He leaned into the isle to get a better look and almost fell out of his chair when he saw him shift his fingers, pulling on a red thread attached to the red blob moving it closer to him and the podium, facing the crowd. That wasn’t just a red blob, it was a dragon. He laughed, looking up at probably the most adorable little red stuffed dragon he’d ever seen sitting at the CEO’s feet, but his laughter was cut short when he realized that wasn’t just a red string. 

He looked down at the string on his finger, trailing down the aisle up onto the stage, connecting to the little red dragon, and ultimately... Seto Kaiba’s hand. He leaned more, trying to get a better look, hoping the red string from his hand lead off the stage somewhere else, hoping he was seeing things, when he fell out of his seat right into the isle. Ryou bolted up and grabbed him, scrambling to pull him back into the row, making him duck down behind the seats and giggled, covering his mouth to keep quiet. It caused maybe a second of a disruption and everything carried on. Everything around him carried on but he felt stuck in a loop. 

Kaiba’s voice was too loud. It was the only thing he could hear, staring at the feet of the people behind them, trying to get a grip on reality because he definitely didn't have one. Seto Kaiba, the CEO of Kaiba Corporation, the guy who Mai’s been ragging on since he started working at Data, the guy who spent the last 5 years publicly, mercilessly, loudly tearing down the string and all who believed in it was _his_ soulmate?! 

It wouldn’t be so bad if it was just that he was an asshole. Sure, he was the kind of person Joey couldn’t stand (ones that flaunt money just because they got it), but there had to be a reason they were connected, right? There had to be something there. If not, why would it be like this? He clutched the string tight to his chest, trying to ground himself with it’s warmth. Why was he doing this? Why was he trying to convince himself there was a real, divine reason, when the sad reality was, Kaiba wouldn’t want anything to do with him. He wouldn’t get the reaction like Yuugi got when he met Atem or the couple outside the cafe. Hell, he’d be _lucky_ if he got what he’d before thought was the worst case scenario. The ‘Oh’. As much as he feared it, he’d taught himself to brace for it. He just had a feeling that’s what he’d get. ‘Oh’. This wouldn’t be like that. This would be so much worse. He wanted to disappear between the seats and go home and pretend this didn’t happen. He could do that right? He didn’t see him. He was sure of that.

Ryou shook his shoulder and he turned to look at him. Then he blinked, reality flooding back to him. His cheeks glistened in what little light was between them. Was he crying? “What the hell happened to ya? I wasn’t leanin’ out there that long.”

Ryou laughed and started to answer when Tristan got out of his seat, ducking down with them on the floor. “What the hell are you doing?”

“I.. hey don’t change the subject. What happened to Ryou?”

Tristan looked over Ryou and smiled sadly, wiping off tear streaks from his cheek. “He- I uh… don’t think we should talk about it here.”

“I just fell out into the isle and came back ta that,” he said, pointing to Ryou’s still tear stained other cheek. “What the fuck happened?”

Tristan sighed, “It’s my fault.”

“Fuckin’ obviously. What’d ya do?”

They shared a weird look; Ryou smiled like he woke up from long well needed nap, but Tristan looked like he was being accused of murder. When they turned back to look at him, Tristan sighed, “We lied. I.. well Duke lied about having more than one string.”

Joey scoffed. “I mean, I coulda guess that, but what’s that gotta do with anythin’?”

“It’s me,” he said, then paused to take a deep breath. “I was the one that had more than one. When I found out I broke one of them cause I.. I was embarrassed I guess. It’s so fucking stupid and I feel like shit about it, but I did.”

Ryou smiled and leaned closer to Tristan. “When he heard me telling you about it being gone he started talking about it and it came back.” He lifted his hand like somehow Joey was going to see it. “It’s there!”

He looked between the two of them, getting ready to say he was happy for him when his thoughts zeroed in on Tristan. “Wait. How’d ya not know it was Ryou? You’re both around each other all the time.”

“He went to visit his dad, remember? For like a month. I got the string and broke it when he was gone.”

“Shit... I forgot about that. So did ya tell Duke?”

“He’s my boyfriend. Of course I told him. What the hell is wrong with you?”

“Don’t start that shit Tris.”

Tristan laughed, but Ryou didn’t. He leaned closer, frowning and squeezed his arm. “Are you okay, Joey?”

“What?”

“Are you okay?”

No. No he wasn’t. “Yeah I’m fine. Just scared myself fallin’. Got flashbacks ‘o the bridge.” He forced a laugh and Ryou smiled squeezing his arm again. “When’s this thing over?”

“It’s almost over, then we’re getting drinks and stuff!”

Drinks. Drinks sounded good.

\---

Joey woke up to knocking on his apartment door a month after the game announcement. He didn’t want to talk to anyone and stopped just before answering the door to make sure he’d actually paid his rent. Of course he paid his rent. He shook his head, chuckling at himself. Old habits die hard. When he opened the door he blinked, shocked to see all of his friends standing on the other side. “Uh.. hey?”

“Hey Joey!” Yuugi waved at him, but Ryou pushed right past all of them, including him, walking into his apartment.

“Wow it’s nice! I love it!”

“Uh yeah thanks. Come on in.”

They funneled into his apartment, flowing into the living room and took up every surface there. Yuugi, Tea, and Atem sat on the floor in front of his entertainment center, Ryou took up most of his sofa and Tristan sat behind him. Duke leaned on his bookcase on the far wall, hands in his pockets. They all kept staring at him. This was getting awkward. “Can I get ya a drink or somethin’?”

Ryou giggled and patted the sofa beside him. “Just sit down, Joey.”

“I dunno what’s goin’ on.”

“We know something’s up with you. We want to know what it is,” Tea said from the floor beside Yuugi. “So come on. Spill.”

“I dunno what ya guys are talkin’ ‘bout. I’m fine.” They collectively gave him an ‘are you serious’ face making him laugh. “Look, it kinda feels like you’re all here for some intervention or somethin’ and really everythin’s fine.”

“Joey, I haven't heard from you since the announcement,” Yuugi murmured.

“Come on Joey,” Duke huffed. “What’s up?”

“Nothin’s up.”

Atem leaned back and shook his head. “You aren’t fooling anyone into believing that. Mai wanted to be here too. So, unless you decide to explain yourself, I’ll call her and she’ll have every soul in Domino City walking up to you asking you what it is.”

That was a threat if he’d ever heard one in his life. He sighed and relented to walking over to the sofa to sit by Ryou. He smiled and squeezed his arm. “I told you about what was going on with me.”

“Yeah I know, but this is different.”

“How?”

“It just is.”

“Were not going to leave you alone until you tell us. Just get it over with.”

“Fine. Ya wanna know? I figured out who’s on the other end of my string and I don’t wanna talk ta them. There. Boom. Done.”

“Liar,” Yuugi said softly, smirking at him. 

“I ain’t lyin’. I know who it is.”

“That’s not what you’re lying about.”

“You’re the worst best friend, man. Ya should be bluffin’ with me.”

Yuugi giggled. “So, who is it?”

Joey just shook his head scratching the back of his neck. He couldn’t say it; just couldn't bring himself to. 

“Why don’t you want to talk to them?”

“I ain’t his type.”

Duke humphed. “Well that narrows down about half the world.”

“Just let it go guys, it's fine.”

“Nope.” Ryou and Tea said in unison.

He looked around the room at his friends (traitors more like). “It’s Kaiba.”

The room was dead quiet, like he thought it would be, and he expected some shocked reactions and understanding, but no. His ‘friend traitors’ were the worst. Ryou leaned in front of him and tilted his head, smirking. “Is that why you fell into the aisle?”

Atem and Yuugi both leaned to the side so they could see his face past Ryou. Yuugi giggled. “You fell in the aisle?”

“Yeah,” Ryou said, leaning back and turning to face Yuugi. “He was leaning over and just fell in the aisle. I had to grab him before he made a fool of himself.”

“So it was you who made that ruckus that paused the announcement ceremony?” Atem asked, smirking, and crossed his arms over his chest. “Should’ve guessed.”

“Yep. See what I mean? It’s not a good idea. I just… let it go, alright?”

“Kaiba’s not inhuman, Joey.” 

Yuugi smiled and nodded. “I like him. He’s fun to work with.”

Tea giggled and nudged Yuugi. “You like everyone.”

“Well yeah, but he’s really not as awful as everyone makes him sound.”

Atem nodded. “That is true.”

“Ya tryin’ ta tell me he ain’t an asshole?”

Yuugi and Atem both laughed. “Oh no, he is,” Yuugi said through his laughter. “That part’s very true.”

He slumped back against the sofa and covered his face with one hand, gesturing for them to leave with the other. “There, now ya know. Get outta here.”

But they didn’t. 

“I'm surprised you could see the string from where you were,” Duke said.

“Well he did lean out into the isle,” Ryou defended.

Joey moved his hand to see Atem shake his head. “It would still be next to impossible to see.”

“He don’t just got the string, he’s got some like…” Joey sat up and reached into his pocket, looking up an image to what he’d thought he saw. He wasn’t even sure that’s what it was then handed the phone to Atem. 

Yuugi leaned over him, then looked at Atem, then Joey. “Are you serious?”

“Yeah. That’s what I saw.”

Atem quirked a brow, looking at the image. When he looked back up with a condescending smile, Joey wanted to punch him in the face. “Are you sure?”

“Yeah I’m fuckin’ sure, Atem. I’m pretty sure you’d notice a fuckin’ stuffed lookin’ little dragon on the stage by him.”

Yuugi burst into giggles, followed by Tea and Ryou. “I mean… I would notice and now that I'm picturing it, I can’t stop.”

“Right?”

“So tell him you can see it.”

“Oh yeah that’s gonna go over fuckin’ great. Ya only do shit like that if you’re fuckin’ sure no one’s gonna see it.”

Atem stole a glance at Yuugi, then resumed staring at the phone. “That is true.”

“So nah. I’m good. I’d rather not get torn down over this.”

“Are you not intending to talk to him at all?”

“Nah.”

“You'll talk to him in a few days or so. You just need to get used to it,” Ryou said, shrugging but Joey had no intention of doing anything like that. 

“Nah I ain’t. Thanks guys, but I know when ta pick my battles.”

Atem and Yuugi shared a look and Atem handed the phone back. “If that is what you wish.”

“Yeah, so if ya guys are done embarassin’ the fuck outta me before I had coffee or food or anythin’, I’m gonna get breakfast.”

“I’ll get you breakfast Joey,” Yuugi said, standing up from the floor. “We’ll all get breakfast.”

\---

Kaiba glanced over at the dragon on the boardroom table, nestled in loops and loops of string like a dragon nest. He was pretty proud of that too. Though something about the string was different. He couldn’t put his finger on it, but it seemed thinner, colder. He was probably just imagining it… like the fucking string. Atem and Yuugi walked into the boardroom with Mokuba bounding behind them, closing the door. He gestured for them to sit down and Mokuba went to his place on the other side of the table with his papers. “You guys did great! We’re selling that game like hot cakes!”

“Aren’t you a little young for that expression?” Atem teased, making Mokuba laugh.

“Yes I am, but I have to deal with a bunch of old guys like you, sooo.”

“Ouch,” Yuugi giggled and shook his head. “I’m glad it’s selling so well.”

“It’s killing the competition! So, we have a new project for you guys.” 

Mokuba handed them papers detailing the new game they wanted produced, but Atem wasn’t reading over it like Yuugi was. Instead he looked up at Mokuba and tilted his head. “I have a question for you first.”

Mokuba blinked and schooled his expression to read all business. “Sure, what’s up?”

“It’s a question for a friend.”

Mokuba’s lips pulled into a mischievous grin. “I love those questions.”

“What does Kaiba do with the thread?”

He didn’t react fast enough. He tried, but needing to get over the shock and sit up when he was casualing leaning back in his chair didn’t help him out at all. Mokuba beamed proudly, airing out all his dirty laundry. “He made a-”

“Mokuba!”

He expected Mokuba to give him his typical ‘what’d I do’ innocent act, but their attention was stolen by a very swift, loud wack from Atem and Yuugi’s side of the table. Atem rubbed his arm looking away from them. “Ow.”

“Sorry! Did I hurt you?”

Atem chuckled and shook his head. “I’m fine, partner.”

“Good.” Then he hit him again so pathetically Kaiba wondered why he bothered. “We’re not supposed to be interfering.”

“I’m not interfering with anything. I was just asking a question.”

“He said he wanted to do it on his own.”

“He also said he wasn’t doing it at all.”

“This isn’t fair.”

“It’s perfectly fair,” Atem said, looking back at Mokuba. “From one friend to another.”

Mokuba jumped up, gasping so loud he sounded like a vacuum cleaner then screeched, “You know!”

“What the hell is going on?”

Mokuba turned to him, pointing at Atem. “They know!”

“Know what?”

Mokuba didn’t answer him, almost jumping on the table. “Who is it? Do I know them?”

Atem started to answer, but Yuugi put his hand over his mouth. “Don’t! He wants to do this on his own. He’s going to be pissed we did this.”

“Tell me or I’ll fire you.”

Atem turned to face him, but Yuugi wasn’t moving his hand. 

“I’ll fire both of you.”

Yuugi relented and dropped his hand, muttering, “Fine. He’s going to be pissed anyway. Might as well try to help.”

“Did you hear about or meet Romeo when you were in Data?”

Mokuba blinked and stood up straight, his smile changed completely and he had no idea what that was supposed to mean. Then he looked at him, looked at Atem then back at him. “Yeah I met him.”

“It’s him.”

Mokuba’s reaction to that made little sense to him. He didn’t screech like he had before and he wasn’t running around the table pushing Kaiba out of the chair to talk to him either. Instead he smiled like he was pleased hearing that and sat down. Just fucking sat down, lifting the papers up. “We were thinking Yuugi could make some storyboards for us to look over first, but these were some of the ideas we thought of.”

Mokuba wasn’t at the top of the list anymore. He titled the fucking list.

Kaiba ignored Mokuba’s attempt at riling him up and tried to think. So they thought they knew who was on the other end of the string. No big deal, but the fact that three people in the room knew and he didn’t grated on him so much more than the damn string ever could. How would they know anyway? Whoever it was could be lying to them. How would they know for sure? Next thing he knew he was talking before he thought it through. “You don’t know anything.”

Atem looked at him, and smirked. “I do.”

“Prove it.”

“He told us what you do with the thread.”

“Oh really?”

Atem nodded. “You made a dragon with it.”

He felt the burn of embarrassment, but pushed through it with sheer spite. “If he knows, why isn't he here?”

Yuugi sighed, slumping into the seat. “I don’t know. I guess he’s worried about what you'll say.”

Kaiba scoffed. Apparently the person on the other end of the string was from Data, a dead end job, and didn’t want to talk to him for fear of something he couldn’t possibly fathom. A moronic leech would be better than a deadbeat coward. This was a waste of time. What did he care?

The dragon moved in his peripheral; wilting, slumping into the nest that now looked more like tangled thread instead of bundled yarn. What was going on with it? He fought the desire to reach out and try to fix it. Not that he had a clue how. Something was wrong with the thread and that didn’t make any sense. He tried for the last five years to cut it, but it was like the string was made of Kevlar. Why was it dwindling now? He had the nagging suspicion, from how the thread dwindled, that it had a direct correlation with whoever was on the other end of the string knowing him. That correlation- the more he thought about it- pissed him off. It filled him with rage from the inside out, crushing his teeth together and making his palms ache from how tight he clenched his fist. So he knew who he was. He knew and what? Chose to cut ties without a word? Kaiba tried for five years to cut the thread, broke a machete blade, countless pairs of scissors and an ax, and spent months making dragons just to deal with it. Meanwhile, this bastard, after seeing him in the fucking distance _once,_ decided to end _the whole thing_. Just like fucking that!? 

He should be elated, watching the dragon sink ever further into the thinning thread. He was almost free. At this rate the string would be gone by dinner, but he was not elated at all. Fueled by a ton of spite and loss from all the time he’d wasted on the damn string, he bolted up from the chair and rounded the table, snatching Yuugi up from the chair by his shirt. Mokuba and Atem bolted up too, but he wasn’t paying attention to them. “Where is he?!”

“I-He-I think he’s at work. I don’t know.”

He threw him back into Atem and spun on his heel, stomping out of the board room. 

\---

Kaiba found him. 

Took 4 hours, several very real death threats and almost running some poor tiny older lady off the road, but he found him; sitting on the end of the pier alone completely wrapped head to toe in the thread so thin he didn’t see it until he was within ear shot. He had his knee pulled up, held tight to his chest, just staring out at the view. The string waved in the breeze between them and when a big gust blew through from off the waves, it picked up the string; snapping it. Kaiba watched it unravel and fade, eventually disappearing altogether. When he glanced back at the bench, he noticed _he_ wasn’t looking out at the ocean anymore, instead resting his forehead on his knee. 

In a split second of clarity he looked down at his hand; free the damn string that plagued him for years. He could turn around, walk away, and never have to deal with this again, but he still felt the same spite from the boardroom keeping him standing there. He wanted to take five years of _his_ life away. Five years of tripping, five years of trying to get away, five years of meetings he couldn’t focus on, opportunities he’d missed because he couldn’t get away from it and at least 6 months of lost dignity. That deserved a punch at the very least… or tossed into the ocean. 

He thought about it.

Five years… Kaiba balled his fists and took a step back, deciding that this would be the end of it. The end of five years. He wouldn’t let it take up anymore of his time. Then he heard him take a strained breath, exhaling then sniffing loudly. “Hope you’re fuckin’ happy.”

He was. So he walked away.

\---

“You did what?!”

“It was the right thing ta do, Yuug’. Come on.”

“How can you say that?!” 

“How can I say that? Seriously?” Joey huffed and jumped off the sofa, muttering under his breath about not believing he had to explain himself. He walked back to his bedroom and grabbed a box he hadn't unpacked yet, carrying it into the living room and throwing it on his coffee table. Yuugi flinched, making him feel bad. “Sorry man.”

“It’s alright,” Yuugi murmured, opening the box and frowning at its contents. “Is this what I think it is?”

“Yeah. Couldn't throw it away.”

Yuugi flashed him a fond smile and pulled out all the gaming magazines, ticket stubs and everything else he had from Duel Monsters. It was the game that Yuugi and he played and played until they couldn’t function, still going to school, still managing to do everything else they needed to. It took over their lives for years and they went to every convention, tournament, panel, and spin off event they had for it. He took the magazine from Yuugi and opened it up to the page he knew proved his point and held it out for him. Yuugi took it, reading over it then looked up at him and smirked. “I’m not sure what you’re trying to say Joey. Cause right now it seems like you’ve been crushing on him for years.”

Joey went beet red and glared at him. “No! Just fuckin’ read it.”

Yuugi giggled, and leaned back, reading over it, but his smile faded and he sighed as he read.

Every year Joey bought these magazines to see when the new games would come out or other shit they wanted to do. Every year they did some interviews and asked Kaiba about who he was dating or some bullshit like that and every year he’d make some awful comment about the string and who was on the other end of it. Every year. That issue had to be the worst, something about ‘if anyone came up to him with the string he’d happily tell them to fuck off and die’. Well, maybe not those exact words. He actually said a lot more and it was worse somehow. Some passive threat, passive warning. He said he hated the string, said he thought whoever bought into it was an idiot and he kept that opinion every year, every article. Sure, it would be legendary if Joey could march into Kaiba’s office, say something stupid like ‘I’m your guy’, and every nasty opinion and harsh word would just fly out the window and they’d ride off into happily ever after, but that was fucking weird to think about or want, and even if he did want that, he wasn’t THAT lucky. Without the string, he didn’t feel lucky at all. 

Yuugi started to say something, then he shut the book with a loud sigh, “That was 4 years ago.”

“Sure was.”

Then he handed him 4 more, all different years, opening them up and handing it to him. Yuugi skimmed over them, holding on to the newest one from a few months ago. “Well this one doesn’t have that in it.”

“That’s ‘cause they didn’t ask.”

“You didn’t even try. How can you be sure? He tells the press all kinds of things he doesn’t believe.”

“Like what? That puppies are cute?”

Yuugi snorted and laughed, shaking his head. “What are you trying to say? You don't think he likes puppies?”

“I’d bet this apartment he’s a cat person. No dog person is that up tight or that much of an asshole.”

Yuugi laughed again. 

“It’s really fine Yuug’. I’ll be fine and he’s got what he wants.”

Yuugi's laughter faded and he tilted his head to the side smiling at him. “Neither of you look fine to me.”

Now it was his turn to laugh. The very idea this affected Kaiba in any way, shape, or form was the best joke he’d ever heard. 

\---

Joey missed the string. 

He missed the added warmth while he walked from his apartment to work. He missed the soft red strewn about his bedroom over his blankets and the floor. He missed the way it tugged at him, pulling at him, reminding him something was there. With it gone, nothing was there, nothing was warm and nothing was red. He thought he could deal with it. Just another set back in the grand scheme of things. He’d dealt with worse, but this felt like cutting off his own hand. Walking down the street, hands shoved in his pockets, red caught his attention everywhere. The little girl with the red balloon, the barista with the red earring in his ear, the older woman with the red hat, the red string in the magazine he passed. Wait a minute...

Joey stopped abruptly, then walked backwards, his eyes trained on a magazine on a news stand. He tilted his head, frowning at it. The cover was a picture of Seto and Mokuba Kaiba with some shit about Duel Monsters’ sales. He picked it up, eyebrow quirked. The red string was clearly visible on the cover (leading off the page, but clearly visible). He flipped the pages, looking for the featured story about the sales and saw more of the string. He didn't know how he felt about it, staring down at the red he’d missed. So he waved it at the teenage girl leaning against the cart. “I wanna get this.”

She rolled her eyes and turned to face the register. He ignored her, handing her some money and took the change back from her. Magazine in hand, he walked back to his place hell bent on figuring out why he could see the string on this magazine and not the others. He fumbled with the keys at the door and dropped the magazine, picking it up he saw the dragon off in the corner on a page Kaiba wasn’t even on. 

More determined than ever, he snatched it up and pushed open his unlocked door. Tossing the magazine on the coffee table, he reached for the box he’d left out since Yuugi was over. He pulled all the magazines out of it again and fanned them out. He picked up the oldest one and flipped through it. One good thing about missing the red, he could see it so much better now and the magazine in his hand was filled with it on every page. He kept thinking about the conversation he had with Yuugi, about Kaiba lying to the press, but looking down at the magazine he still felt like he was hiding it. So he kept searching, pulling out pages, cutting and tearing out images of hidden strings and he quickly realized he needed more than just this to figure it out. 

Over the next 2 months, he bought every magazine, newspaper, and brochure, got a hold of every boot leg interview and commentary he could get his hands on, and scoured the internet for fan pictures searching for the string. At the end of two months, he had a collage of red on the wall of his bedroom. Half the wall was his own pictures of his string, his room, his home, his friends and all they ways the string bled through his life over the last 5 years. The other side of the wall was covered in pictures he’d collected of Kaiba. Staring at Kaiba’s side, he realized those images told a pretty detailed story of his complete detachment from the string. He never wore it. Never. Never let it touch him aside from his hand. He always found some way to pull it behind him so it was mostly hidden, but he couldn’t hide it from everyone. Since Joey was actually delving into this, he realized the string was staring him in the fucking face the whole 5 years and felt like a complete idiot for not seeing it earlier, but in his defense, it was hard to see red when he was surrounded in red and that was the story these pictures told. 

They were both surrounded, drowning, in red. He had it everywhere in his room, covering his dresser, the bed, the floor; tangled around his friends when they’d come over and himself. As much as Kaiba tried to keep it away from his person, he had it exactly the same way Joey did, covering his desk, his office, his boardroom, and the stages and podiums he stood at for conferences and interviews. It was everywhere. His gaze swept down to the newest pictures on Kaiba’s side. The ones that looked out of place amongst the rest. Opening day for the new Duel Monsters tournament Kaiba sat with his elbow on the arm of the chair and his fingers pressed to his temple, glaring at something like he normally did, but what Joey couldn’t stop looking at the string wrapped around his palm, leading down to the dragon sitting in his lap. The others were similar. Since he had the dragon, which Joey assumed happened this last year, he changed how he handled the string. The dragon was either in his lap, on a nearby surface or sitting at his feet. Never on it’s side, haphazardly tossed about, always staged and always facing wherever Kaiba was; almost as if it were listening in and participating as well. Kaiba did that on purpose. There were too many pictures to say it was just a coincidence.

He huffed and buried his hands in his hair. Kaiba went from not wanting anything to do with it to making the best of a shitty situation and that realization stung. He gave up the string because of what he’d seen Kaiba say and do, because of his preconceived idea that because it was him on the other end of the string, neither of them needed to deal with it. He glared at the pictures, realizing he just did what he was afraid Kaiba was going to do. Took one look at him, judged him on it, and walked away. He thought he was doing the right thing, but it looked like Kaiba hated _the string_ , not him and he’d probably fucking known that if he’d just talked to him. Sure he’d be a dick about it, but since when did he expect anything else? He knew he was going to be a dick about it now, even when Joey stood up to leave his apartment.

He might miss the string, but it was meant to lead him somewhere not keep him still. If that meant pestering the ever loving fuck out of The Seto Kaiba until he talked to him, he could do that. He had nothing better to do.

\---

Kaiba maybe, sort of, perhaps, _conceivably..._ missed the string. 

Without it his office looked empty, dull, and far too spacious to be comfortable. It was disappointing; not frustrating or upsetting, just disappointing. So he poured himself into work, collaborating with Mokuba and sometimes Atem and Yuugi on new games and directions to take Chronicle (the new game Yuugi and Atem designed). He didn’t see or hear from _him_ after the string disappeared. Yuugi and Atem never mentioned him again, he never showed up randomly or attempted to contact him in anyway, and Mokuba didn’t bring it up either. He was relieved everyone dropped it, that it was so clean cut and not a fight like everything else was, but something in the back of his mind lead him to believe this was too good to be true. Four months after that, he still expected it to come up again. It couldn’t be this easy. Nothing’s this easy, but as the months passed, he finally accepted it might actually be that easy. 

“Hey big brother! Look what I got!”

Mokuba walked into the office with a parcel about the size of a couple shoe boxes, which was what he thought it was. He smirked at Mokuba’s brilliant smile and returned to the programming code he needed to fix. “You have a box.”

“I do have a box, but it’s not my box,” Mokuba sang and sat the box down on the desk in front of him. “It’s for you.”

Kaiba looked at the box, then narrowed his eyes at Mokuba. “What is it?”

“I have no idea.”

“Where’d you get it?”

“Ms. Valentine brought it by. Said it was delivered to Data by mistake.” That was clearly a lie. The box had no markings on it. “So, of course I told her I’d take it right to you.”

Of course. Kaiba narrowed his eyes further.

“Because hey-” he shrugged- “could be important.”

Oh he doubted that highly.

“So are you going to open it?”

“No.”

“It could be important.”

“Or it could be anthrax,” he muttered, shoving the box towards Mokuba too hard and it flew into him. 

Mokuba laughed and pushed it gently back. “Come on. Open it. If it’s anthrax I can make a break for it to the door and then I’ll run Kaiba corporation and then the world!” 

Kaiba snickered and shook his head. “No.”

“Okay,” he sighed, throwing his arms out to his sides in mock defeat, “If you’re sure.”

“I’m sure.”

“Well, then I’ll just have to post this message on the account I made for you on threadsofus.com saying that you turned your true love away and are so utterly heartbroken you’re begging for him to come back.” His grin was positively evil. “And I’ll name names.”

Before he could attempt to call his bluff, Mokuba fished out his phone, hit some buttons, then turned it. That was not a bluff. “You’re grounded.”

“After you open the box.”

“Why don’t you just tell me what’s in here since you’re blackmailing me?”

Mokuba sat down on the desk and shrugged. “I really don’t know what it is. I wasn’t lying, Mai did bring it by and told me it was from Joey and to give it to you.”

“Who’s Joey?”

Mokuba grinned like he’d waited his whole life for that question. “Your soulmate!”

So he opened the box, shooting him glares that could freeze mercury. What else was he supposed to do? He knew it was too easy. He should’ve known Mokuba was up to something. Should've stopped it from the beginning, but he didn’t and now he was paying the price. Inside the box was another box and a card. Normally, the card is to be opened first, but Kaiba didn’t want to hear anything he had to say. So he just opened the box. 

And stared at it.

“What?”

Kaiba didn't answer him, looking at almost an exact replica of the little red dragon he’d made with the string. The only reason he could tell the difference was the shimmery red glass eyes and little imperfections that Kaiba would never allow. He pulled it out and set it down on the desk, ignoring Mokuba’s gasp. “Is that-” He stopped mid sentence and snatched up the card, tearing open the envelope.

“That’s not yours.”

He ignored him and opened the card, reading it allowed. “Thought I’d replace your dragon since I ruined it.” Kaiba looked up from the dragon at Mokuba as he flipped the card around to the back then the front, then dropped it into his lap. “That’s all it says.”

He stared at the dragon, taking in all the imperfections and the likeness to his. This was exactly like the second one he’d made. He’d modified the pattern to make it. How did he replicate it? Marveling over how similar it was, he didn't notice Mokuba reach around his desk until he heard his drawer open up. “What are you doing?”

“Getting out paper so you can write him back.”

“No.”

“Yeah, blackmail is still very much in action.”

“Just… wait. Let me think about it.”

Mokuba let it go and sighed, “Okay. I’ll leave you two alone.” 

He scowled at Mokuba, walking out of his office and shutting the door behind him, then scowled at the dragon on his desk. He kept scowling at it, trying to decide what to do with it. The answer was pretty straight forward; throw it away. He unraveled his. Then again, he gave him a shred of credit for doing this. It didn’t have to do with the dragon. If he gave him a stuffed dragon like this his reaction would be very different. It took months to make both dragons he’d crocheted from the red string, and seeing how this one was riddled with imperfections, he’d guess it took ‘Joey’ that long too. 

He gave him time. Whether he liked it or not, he appreciated the gift of time.

\---

Yuugi had his fingers pressed to his lips, staring at the envelope with him with just as much anticipation and he had. He wasn’t expecting to get anything back from Kaiba, especially that fast, and was a little worried it was a ‘leave me the fuck alone or I’ll make sure you’re locked up and they throw away the key’. So when he pulled out the card stock from the envelope with a single sentence on it, he was a little surprised. 

‘I made two dragons.’

Yuugi blinked and tilted his head at the card. “I don’t get it.”

He did. “Urgh… fuck… Atem I need your help again.”

Atem snickered from the kitchen, “Did he throw it away?”

“I dunno. Just says he made two.”

“Ahh.” Atem walked around the corner with a cup of tea he made for Yuugi. “So what help are you needing? I already showed you how to make it.”

“Cause you’re house husband material,” Yuugi giggled, then pouted when Atem pulled the cup of tea away from him. “I take it back.”

Atem started to hand him the tea then paused again, narrowing his eyes. “That doesn’t sound any better.”

Yuugi kissed him, distracting him long enough to steal the tea. 

“Focus guys.”

“Sorry.” Yuugi brushed his bangs behind his ear and lifted the cup to his lips.

“I’m thinkin’ I already made it further than I planned. Now I dunno what ta do.”

Atem snickered and shook his head. “Understandable, but we can’t exactly help you.”

“We can’t, but I know someone who could.”

“Who?”

“Mokuba.”

\---

“It’s not fucking hard,” Kaiba muttered, glaring at his useless team of 6 idiots (the minimum to run the event since the game kept booting people over 6 from it) on the new mmorpg Atem and Yuugi created. “Best gamers in the world my ass.”

They weren't that bad, all the way up until they hit a puzzle. Since he was working, he stayed out of it, mostly checking up on the bugs that he had reports about on this particular puzzle. They were trying to solve it, he was trying to break it. Part of the fun was pissing the others off while he was zero help and seeing them throw fits. Little did they know, he could easily out play all of them. 

“I’m pretty sure you could play this better,” he said to the new little blue dragon sitting with the red one beside him on the sofa. 

He should throw them both away, but he just couldn’t. He intended to keep the red one no matter what. It was like a payment back of his time and every time he looked at it, that’s how it felt; justified. The blue one… he didn’t have a good reason for that. It was a blue and white dragon. Couldn't go wrong there. The note that came with it was a different story. Joey apparently thought after making him two crochet dragons that he could ask him out and he’d just eagerly agree. He was out of his mind. So he bought a bundle of yarn that matched the dragons and set it on fire, then mailed the ashes with a note saying ‘no’ back. That should be clear enough and he got to keep them without him knowing. 

One of the gamers in their group dropped, either from the connection issues he already knew about or lack of brain cells to handle a puzzle and another one popped on; Shadowfox. Kaiba glared at the screen, watching him like a hawk. He’d already received several complaints about this particular gamer, but with him being the CEO of Gamex and had a gaming channel crucial to gaming sales, he couldn’t really do much about it. Shadowfox wandered around the puzzle, seeming like he was helping them with expert knowledge of the puzzles inner workings. Which he should know all of that after causing so much trouble in each event he was part of. For whatever reason, he seemed to be playing with the others just fine, getting though the puzzle and moving on to something else. He wondered if the complaints had any credibility. He wasn’t causing trouble here.

So he went back to following the party and trying to get it to glitch. They reached a jumping puzzle with platforms over lava, cliche but still challenging. He actually stopped hunting for glitches for a second there, watching Wereswordsgo84 fall off every platform he jumped on or just not make it to them at all. He chuckled to himself, when he noticed Shadowfox knock Lolamoon00 off the puzzle. Weird but not uncommon. Then he started pushing anyone he could get to off the edge. Just doing everything they possibly could to disrupt it. He sighed, debating on interfering. He shouldn’t. It would blow his cover, cause a problem with Gamex that he just didn’t want to deal with, and he’d have to make a new account to finish checking the glitches, but it was getting out of hand. Or maybe it wasn’t and they were all just fucking around. He grabbed headphones without a mic attachment and plugged them in so he could hear what was going on. As soon as the headphones were plugged in, he regretted it.

He winced from a loud voice over them. “Seriously fuckin’ stop.”

Shadowfox stopped disrupting them and didn’t respond. So, Kaiba reached for the cord to pull out the headphones when Shadowfox pushed wereswordsgo84 off the platform into a glitch area that killed everyone instantly. A woman's voice groaned into the headset, “Why’d you do that?”

He laughed, “Why not?”

That guy did the same thing 5 more times before the others stopped trying. The loud one spat into the headphones, “What the fuck is your problem?”

“This game fucking sucks.”

“Then get off.”

“No. It’s way more fun to make sure you losers can’t do anything.”

“I can’t get into another round,” she said, “I’ve been kicked out too many times. It'll lock me out. If you don’t want to play, leave.” 

Kaiba scribbled on the notepad next to him about lifting that ban until they could fix the glitch.

“You suck so much there’s no point in staying. Let it lock you out. I’m doing everyone a favor.”

“So far I’ve seen her playin’ a hell of a lot better than ya are. I’d keep my mouth shut,” the loud one said.

“She’s a cam girl. Still going to defend her?”

She gasped and screamed into the headset making him wince. “Fuck you!”

“Don’t listen ta him Lola. Since he lives in his mom’s basement and the only other girl he’s ever seen ‘sides his mom is a cam girl, he thinks alla ya are.”

“I fucking invented Gamex and have models begging for me to fuck them and those dumb bitches could play better than her too.” He laughed cruelly, “Sorry. You’re right, Were. Lola isn't a cam girl. She sounds fucking ugly as hell.”

“Hey, come on.” Xheri, one of the other gamers in the group, said, using his character to nudge Lolamoon00 towards the puzzle. “Let’s just finish the puzzle and get this over with.”

They tried again, he did it again. Kaiba scribbled a note on the pad about making custom groups. When he looked back up, Lolamoon00 dropped and Shadowfox cackled into the headset. Now they didn’t have enough players and the loading screen for another player kept cycling. “She’s probably fucking crying too.” Then he laughed more.

“I'm reporting you,” Xheri spat.

“For what? Hurting your feelings. Fuck off.”

Kaiba decided, since they weren't going to be doing the level anyway to get back to testing out the glitch. As soon as he moved, the asshole zeroed in on him. “Oh come on.”

He did everything, and that was an understatement, to keep him from doing anything. Running into him, knocking him away or into places that he couldn’t get out off and had to kill himself to start over. After about ten minutes of that, Kaiba got up and grabbed his gaming headset. If he wanted to play that way, he could play back. 

He plugged it in and once again, winced from the loud one arguing with the asshole. “Look. I get you’re just a douchebag and got nothin’ better ta do in your mom’s basement and all, but some of us would actually like ta fuckin’ play the game.”

“I don't know why you’re bitching at me. That guy doesn't even have a headset. It’s a fucking online rpg. Invite only. If you can’t afford a headset, you shouldn’t be playing.”

“Fuck. You. Shadowfox. I’ve had it with your bullshit. Ya got no idea what’s goin’ on with him. His headset coulda fuckin’ broke. This could be the game he’s dreamed a betain’ for fuckin’ years or maybe he has fuckin’ social anxiety and douchebags like ya are why he don’t turn the mic on. One of these days you’re gonna spout off infronta the wrong person. You’re a sexist narcissistic asshole and fuck if I know why anyone would invite ya ta do shit!” The loud one groaned into the headset, muttering under his breath ‘this is why he doesn’t play games with tweens’ and that just so happened to be the weak spot of the asshole. 

Both of them shouted at each other, threatening each other, and Kaiba rolled his eyes feeling a headache coming on. This was officially out of hand. “Are you both finished?”

The loud one shut up immediately. The asshole not so much. “He speaks!”

“This is the last warning I’m giving you Landon or you will be terminated from all Kaiba Corporation’s games indefinitely.”

There was silence for a moment, he expected that since he used his real name and not his gamer tag, but that didn't last long. “Look I don’t know who you think you’re talking to, but I don’t take shit from anyone.”

“Even when you’re talking to the CEO of Kaiba Corporation who sent you the invitation to beta our games for your channel? Which we will no longer be doing as of now. We don’t need to do business with someone as unprofessional as you are.”

There was silence on the headset then one of the other gamers whispered, “Is that really Seto Kaiba?”

“Yep,” the loud one said, popping the ‘p’. 

Kaiba narrowed his eyes at the screen, about to ask how he'd possibly know that when the asshole started talking again, “Kaiba doesn’t play his own piece of shit games. It’s pretty clear from playing through this one. I don’t know who the fuck you are, but you can’t do shit.”

“Of course not,” Kaiba said, reaching past his pad of paper for his laptop. He sent a message to Yuugi to kick him out of the beta and waited. 

The asshole dropped out and Kaiba glanced at his laptop at the message from Yuugi saying it was taken care of and to say hi to Joey for him. He narrowed his eyes at it, then looked back at the screen. Wait a minute…

Starfixh, who’d been completely silent through the whole thing sighed in relief, “It’s a miracle. He’s gone!”

“Thank you, Mr. Kaiba, and don’t worry. You’re cover’s safe with us,” Xheri said, not nearly as confident as he was before. 

He thought about logging out of the account and making another so he could go check out the glitch in other places when he heard the loud one, the one he’d now realized was Joey, the one he’d tried to avoid, say, “Kuribos4losers… ha! I get it now. Ya fuckin’ with Yuug’, right? Shit, I gotta take a screen shotta that. So uh… Since I defended your honor, ya change your mind ‘bout what I asked ya?”

He didn’t know if it was because they were on a group chat and he just brought that up in front of his potential customers or if it was just the question in general or the fact that the still had the two dragons on the sofa beside him, but he was stiflingly warm in his turtleneck and frustrated at everything and nothing. “No.”

“Hey I tried.” He sounded almost disappointed, but Kaiba didn’t know if he was hearing things or not, especially when he was back to his loud self in the next breath. “Ya should play an event with us. You’re already here.”

“I have work to do.”

“Oh come on! Dazzle us with your charmin’ personality.”

“How are you even in here? Mokuba sent you an invite, didn’t he?”

“What’s it matter? I was gonna get it from somewhere.”

He smirked and leaned back on the sofa, glancing at the dragons. “Fine.”

He heard a ‘wow’ from someone. Then Joey snorted. “Ha! Little do they know you’re just as much a dick as that guy was.”

“I’m worse.”

Now without the weight in the air between them, they all started talking, goofing off, playing the game and Kaiba stayed online, checking glitches, having _them_ check glitches and playing through the game Atem and Yuugi made; how it was meant to be played. Joey sucked at the game, probably the worst out of the group of them, and Kaiba made sure he knew all about it every chance he had. Most people would’ve reacted like the girl did with the asshole insulting her, leave the game, but Joey’d laugh or agree or tell him to fuck off not taking anything he said to heart at all. He also got him back every now and then. Kaiba decided he didn’t hate him as much as he thought he would.

As luck would have it, Yuugi popped into the group towards the end. Immediately Starfixh locked up and became the worst of the group. Apparently she was star struck or something by Yuugi being in the game and she could not function and everyone made sure she knew they knew why. By 6 in the morning, he had a better understanding why Yuugi and Atem wanted it to be more of a coop game instead of pvp. This was… fun. He decided at the end of it, he needed to take more time off to play these games and he made the right decision staying on it.

\---

Mokuba called the meeting and he looked pale as a sheet pacing along the wall when Kaiba walked into the boardroom. He frowned at him then frowned at Atem and Yuugi’s refusal to meet his eyes. “What happened?”

“Well… the beta testing is over.”

He waited, but Mokuba didn’t continue. “And?”

“Well… we have some publicity...problems...ish.”

“What do you mean ‘ish’?”

“So Shadowfox reamed Kaiba Corp. and all his gamer followers are pulling from Chronicles. Which means Gamex and Scanto are dragging it too.”

“Good.”

“I figured you’d say that. Starfixh’s web series and Comstat are currently our biggest support and they’ve pulled EL and Gamfunk into the mix too. We’ve got plenty of good feedback and a juicy scandal to send Chronicles into the next century.”

“So what's the problem?”

“So… um…”

Everyone shifted uncomfortably and he sat down glaring at them. “Just spit it out.”

Mokuba set his tablet in front of him and turned on a video, a direct feed from the gamers in his party when Shadowfox was spouting off. Turned out they were all linked together, streaming it live and talking outside of the group chat; which made sense why everyone was so damn quiet except Joey. He sighed through his nose, watching the video.

‘Starfixh made a face at the live feed with the joined gamers listening intently to the argument with Joey and Shadowfox and whispered, “oh my god.”

When his own voice came on to stop the fight and ban Shadowfox, Xheri was freaking out bouncing in his chair and soundlessly mouthing, ‘this is the best day of my life’. After they got over the fact that they were indeed talking to Kaiba, the gaming feed ended. Xheri and potofsomthingish had a detailed, long argument about whether Joey was flirting with Kaiba or not, resulting in a ‘yes he was’ and that Kaiba was flirting back, to which they all agreed.’

Well that’s just great. Then Mokuba switched over to Starfish’s channel and played her newest video.

“So we’ve gotten so much more feedback from our live feed than we ever thought and you guys are asking so many questions and we have so many questions so I’ll try to answer as best as I can. First I want to thank you for making this little channel your go to for Chronicle. We just boomed overnight and it’s because of all of you thank you so much! So we had live feed going since we started the beta and were about 3 hours in when this happened. You can definitely watch the whole showdown between shadowfox and wereswordsgo84 before the CEO of Kaiba Corporation shut it fuckin’ down on this link-” then she pointed to the edited in link on the screen- ”but I’m sure you guys want to talk about how our live feed suddenly ends.”

He frowned.

“As soon as we realized that the CEO of Kaiba Corporation was in the same party as us, we cut our feed immediately and figured we’d start it back up when he left the party right? Guys. Guys! We played Chronicle all night long with the fucking creators of Chronicle! Not only did Seto Kaiba stay in our party and continue playing the game but Yuugi Mutou, the lead game designer who came up with all the games puzzle aspects lead us through the game and showed us a few Easter eggs while we helped them clean up some glitches. Like. It was surreal and we all downed so much Monster and coffee I think Xheri was seeing sounds at one point, but it was the best experience we’ve ever had gaming; playing an engaging and beautiful game made by the imagination of a literal cinnamon roll! Everything you heard about Yuugi Mutou being the most chill down to earth sweetest guy in the world is totally true. Yuugi, if you’re watching this, we love you!”

Atem snickered, “I like them.”

Kaiba glanced up at Yuugi’s bet red face hidden behind his hands, but he could clearly see it in the top of his ears and around his hairline. “You’d think I'd be used to it by now, I've seen it 4 times.”

“So I’ve done a little digging into who wereswords84 was because he just seemed to know Seto Kaiba and Yuugi Mutou too well to just be a nerdy fan like the rest of us were. Turns out he was not only one of the top ranking players of Duel monsters during its first run as scapothegoats, but he’s best friends with Yuugi Mutou and… we’re all pretty sure he’s Seto Kaiba’s boyfriend and if not, it’s a work in progress.”

Kaiba stopped listening to the video at that point. She went on to talk about the actual game, but he was still hung up on how he could possibly salvage this. How bad was it really? If Mokuba and everyone in the room liked like a time bomb was about to go off, it wasn’t just this video. The end of the video he looked up at Mokuba and he lifted his shoulders smiling. “Well on a positive note, everyone already thinks you're dating so you totally can, right?”

\---

With the old account compromised, Kaiba made a new one scapgots4losers. He got through a few final glitches, reporting the patterns, then received a message. He glanced at it and groaned. How did he find him? He ignored it, but he kept getting more and more and more messages until he finally relented, opening up a chat.

“What do you want?”

“So first you’re fuckin’ with Yuug’, now you’re fuckin’ with me. Scapegoats for losers, huh? What’d I do?”

“Actually, the old one was a crack at Atem and what haven’t you done?”

To his surprise, Joey was completely silent. He played through another area and thought about logging off when he heard him sigh. “I dunno how ya stand all the publicity crap. Ain’t it botherin’ ya? I feel like I can’t fuckin’ breathe.”

“You get used to it.”

“Is that why ya hated the string? Felt like ya couldn’t breathe?”

Something like that. 

“Ya like the dragons?”

“I sent them back to you.”

“Ha! Nah, I dunno what ya fuckin’ sent me, but the dragons I made got glass eyes.”

“They burned.”

“That ain’t how it works,” Joey laughed.

“They melted.”

“Ha! Yeah, whatever.”

Kaiba smirked, glancing over at the two dragons side by side next to him. 

“My offer’s still there, ya know. No strings attached.”

“You’re not funny.”

“Oh come on that one was good.”

He just shook his head, not dignifying that with a comment.

“So?”

“I’ll think about it.”

There was silence over the headset again, then he saw several other messages from the gamers he’d talked to before asking him to play again. How’d they find him too?

“Well, while you’re thinkin’ ‘bout it, ya wanna play through this event?”

He sighed, glancing at the clock. Sure why not? What dignity did he have to salvage? “I don’t know. The last event I participated in caused a social media war I’d rather not start again.”

Joey scoffed. “Kaiba Corp thrives on shit like that. Don’t try ta tell me it don’t.”

\----

Two months later, Kaiba still hadn’t answered him. Not that he expected him to. He was surprised he’d said he’d think about it instead of ‘eat shit and die’. So that was progress and he held on to the progress when he left work that night. Yuugi and Atem waited outside for him, but when he met them on the sidewalk, he noticed they were awkwardly talking to a small group. One of the girls spun around when he started walking towards them and gasped. “It’s you!”

“Uh… hey?”

“I’m Lolamoon from Chronicles. You stood up for me and I wanted to thank you.”

“Oh.” He smiled and shrugged. “Hey, it ain’t nothin.”

“I was ah wondering if you wanted to get a drink or something?”

He blinked, unsure how to answer that. He was waiting for Kaiba to give him a straight answer, then again he’d probably be an old man by that point. Still, he felt the same tug he did when he was with Mai. “I uh. Maybe some other time. Gotta work in the mornin’, ya know?”

She nodded, taking a step towards him and holding out a folded piece of paper. “Well this is my number.”

He hesitantly reached out for it, deciding it was better to just take it and throw it away than get into why he was dodging her attempt at asking him out. Then she grabbed his hand, pulling him closer, and kissed his cheek. He was too stunned to move, locked up and wide eyed. Hell he couldn’t get his lungs to fucking work either, but somehow he was moving, wooshing backwards so fast he gasped and almost reached out to grab her thinking he was falling. Next thing he knew Kaiba was between him and the girl. He just stared at his back, blinking like an idiot. Where the fuck did he come from?! 

“In case that was unclear to you, he’s not interested.”

“Oh… Oh, I didn’t realize… I’m sorry,” she stuttered and, he assumed, walked away. He could hear her shoes on the pavement even though he couldn’t see around Kaiba.

“Hey Kaiba!” Yuugi chirped happily.

Kaiba humped and turned, glaring down his nose at him. That pissed him off. “What?”

“Change your mind already?”

Joey blinked and watched him start to walk away. What? _What?!_ “Hey!”

But Kaiba didn’t stop.

He balled his fist, lifting it to shout at him and give him a good piece of his mind when something red in his hand caught his attention. The string? His questioning gaze followed it from his hand to the concrete, snaking along it up to Kaiba; still walking away, but now with a little red dragon following him. He looked back at his hand, feeling light and warm and really lucky all over again. He didn’t change his mind, but apparently Kaiba did. He gave it back. He gave him back the string. He looked back up at the lengthening string and ran after him. It might not be the look like they’d known each other their whole lives or arms wrapped around him so tight it felt more like two halves became one or a gutted regret and longing to be together again, but it wasn’t any less important, any less meaningful. They had something there; something that could be stronger than steel and tough as Kevlar, warm enough to stave off the cold, bright and alive. He promised himself, running down the sidewalk after Kaiba and following the thick bright red string, he wasn’t going to let it go this time. 


End file.
